Nyctophilia
by SallyJAvery
Summary: If the Dark Lord dies, what replaces him? Devastated by Voldemort's brief reign, Magical Britain rots from the inside out. Former enemies are thrown together in a desperate attempt to fight the decay - by any means necessary. Dark, Post-DH, EWE, Major Character Death.
1. Chapter 1

_**A/N:** This is new, and different, and I hope that you'll like it, because it's actually been making itself very loud inside my head for a while now. Let me know, anyway._

 _ **Disclaimer:** These are not my characters, and I am simply playing with them in the world brought to life by the genius of Joanne Rowling_.

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 **1: Drop**

* * *

Harry's hand: sweaty, grimy, bones clearly visible under the scarred flesh.

She held his hand as though if she let it go it wouldn't be real and he would still be dead and that feeling that she'd had when she had seen his body in Hagrid's arms – that sick, vertiginous, standing on a clifftop feeling – would return, and the world really would end.

"It worked," she whispered, finally looking up and meeting his gaze.

"It worked," he replied, eyes wide and shocked as he studied her. Cataloguing the damage, she realised. She smiled and shook her head slightly to indicate that she wasn't badly hurt, and he understood the way that he always understood, finally hugging her tightly, huffing a great sigh of relief in her ear. Hermione was crying and she buried her face in his shoulder, breathing him in, still scarcely able to believe it.

They'd won. They were alive. He, Harry, her best friend – no, her brother – was alive, and Hermione started to shake with laughter that bordered on hysteria, tears spilling over her cheeks only to be caught in the soft wool of the Weasley jumper that Harry wore.

A hand clasped her shoulder and she broke away from Harry to throw an arm around Ron, drawing him in so that the three of them stood, tucked in each other's embrace. There would be time for grief; this was a moment of joy to snatch from the dark.

When they finally stepped apart Ron looked down and caught Hermione's eye, blushing, and she smiled and shrugged, the memory of kissing him already seeming stupid in the light of…whatever this was that came after. Ron's eyes scanned anxiously over her face for a moment before he relaxed and returned her sheepish smile. Harry shook his head and muttered, "Thank Merlin for that."

Hermione fought the urge to tell him to shut up, but her mood was already darkening as her eyes moved across the destruction of the Great Hall. Across the ashen, disbelieving faces of those who had survived. Across the too-still forms of those who had not. She could see Molly bent double over Fred's body. Could see the pink of Tonks's hair gone dull, and the tatty tweed of Lupin's trousers fluttered by the wind where he lay unmoving beside his wife.

A sob rose in Hermione's throat, and she dropped her eyes to the floor to try and regain some control.

That was when the screaming started.

When she looked up, she could see Narcissa Malfoy, her usual frostiness abandoned as she struggled against the restraining arms of two Aurors. Lucius Malfoy was kneeling on the ground, clearly winded, and Draco was being dragged towards the exit of the Great Hall. Hermione frowned: they had won. The Light had won, so why were the Ministry wizards acting like the worst of Voldemort's thugs?

"NO!" Narcissa was shouting, "No, you don't understand, you can't take him away! He didn't have a choice, you don't UNDERSTAND!"

Hermione turned to look at Harry and Ron, who were both wearing horrified expressions to match her own, and then suddenly Narcissa had broken away from the Aurors holding her and was there in front of Harry, grasping his hands, her honey-blonde hair coming loose from its chignon and falling around her face, making her look somehow younger, tragic and beautiful. "You owe me, Potter," she breathed, and Hermione watched as the distraught woman's fingers clenched white around Harry's before more Aurors came and restrained her.

"Sorry about that Potter," said a soot-stained Roger Davies as he came to stand beside them, inspecting the torn sleeve of his Junior Auror robes. "We'll see that it doesn't happen again."

Looking around the three of them Hermione could see most of the witches and wizards in the hall had diverted their gaze, clearly embarrassed by what seemed to be Narcissa Malfoy's sanity fleeing her. Hermione could already see the conclusions forming - _she was a Black, wasn't she, before she married. Look at the sister. Look at the cousin_.

 _This is wrong_ , she thought to herself, _we're better than this_. As Davies stepped away to join the other Aurors restraining Narcissa, Hermione turned back to Harry, noting the tightness in his jaw and the way his green eyes flashed behind his glasses. They watched as Malfoy was dragged from the Hall, followed by his father, and then Harry's gaze turned towards the group corralled in the corner by the DMLE forces. Finally Harry brought his eyes to meet Hermione's. She opened her mouth but he gave a tiny shake of his head. "Whatever. I just want this day to be fucking over."

Ron gave a shaky chuckle and patted his best friend on the back. He didn't appear to notice when Harry reached out and squeezed Hermione's hand gently, slipping a folded square of parchment from his hand to hers, before stepping away to join the Weasleys where they had gathered amidst the bodies of the fallen.

With a quick glance about to ensure that no-one was watching her, Hermione smoothed out the parchment. It appeared to be a series of small, sketched diagrams, scribbled notes of different spells - some of which she recognised, and some that she did not. The low, leaden weight that settled in her stomach told her none of them were nice. The diagrams were mostly obscure except for one, at the bottom of the page. When her eyes found it Hermione felt the weight in her stomach twist until she thought she might be sick, because she knew the round room that had been quickly sketched out, knew the doors ranged all around the edge. The Department of Mysteries.

Hermione scrunched her eyes shut, dropping her chin to her chest as she balled the parchment in her fist and took a deep breath. Finally she lifted her head, and found Narcissa Malfoy staring at her from where she had been forced to her knees besides the rest of Voldemort's surviving followers. When their eyes met the youngest of the Black sisters held Hermione's gaze, her grey eyes wide as she mouthed, "You. Owe. Me." Hermione shivered, but gave a tiny nod before she looked past Narcissa, her eyes ranging across the bowed heads of the mostly Slytherin students sat with the other surviving Voldemort sympathisers until they came to rest on one tawny mop of hair.

As though he could feel her stare, he looked up from his contemplation of the blood-stained flagstone in front of him. Startling hazel eyes met chocolate brown and Hermione flinched away instinctively, her fingers clenching on her wand as she turned to follow the others.

She tucked herself beneath Harry's arm and he turned his face to her hair, murmuring quietly so that the others wouldn't hear. "What was it?"

"I don't know." Hermione said honestly. "But I'm pretty sure it's bad." Her eyes roved back to the group in the corner of the hall. "And getting answers isn't going to be any fun."

 **OOOOO**

Transporting him from Hogwarts to the Ministry's holding cells the guards were considerate enough to do nothing that would leave a bruise – or at least, not one easily visible. In that the treatment was more fastidious than he was used to and so Theo bore the kicks to his stomach and kidneys, the heavy feet upon his insteps and the twisting of his wrists with little more than a grimace. They did not raise their wands against him and in a body that bore the memory of the Cruciatus curse so casually administered by his father and, later, the Dark Lord, anything less was mere annoyance.

He regained consciousness behind bars, and once he was in a condition to he began to pace his cell, measuring it by hands and feet. He was surprised to find that he could summon a little wandless magic, and used it to write arithmantic equations upon the smooth stones of the walls, puzzling at the many layers of spells built into their very fabric. He had deciphered the more simple wards within the first couple of days: important, he knew, to keep both mind and body active.

The sparse furnishings were charmed unbreakable, and when, after a week, Theo made a single attempt (intellectual, of course) to gouge at his own flesh with his fingernails it had resulted in him healing instantaneously. Which was intriguing enough to have him trying throwing himself at the floor and walls hard enough to break bones, all with the same result.

And so he spent the next three days working out the complex binding that had been added, like a thin patina, over the top of the other wards. It would appear that the spell was finished with a drop of his own blood, and Theo had smiled when he'd drawn this conclusion, perversely pleased at the hypocrisy of it.

He was fairly certain the spell was one that he had read about in one of his father's books: used by the Inquisition to keep prisoners alive for days in cells that they had bricked up. Banned, or so he'd assumed. Blood magic of this sort was always listed with the darkest of Dark and yet here it was, actively practised within the Ministry of Magic. How beautiful the world must appear from the moral high ground.

When he felt the wards lift on the thirteenth day of his confinement he expected a Ministry lawyer. One of those fusty solicitors employed solely to lend credence to a defence against whatever foregone conclusion the Wizengamot saw fit to pass down upon those caught with their fingers in the wrong pies. What he got was a pair of extremely pissed-off looking Aurors.

Theo rose from his cot and offered a small, polite bow to the two men, angling his body slightly towards the wizard he presumed was the more senior of the pair as he spoke. "Auror Shacklebolt. How may I be of service?"

"That's Minister Shacklebolt to you," spat the man stood to Shacklebolt's right, who Theo remembered being the year above him at Hogwarts. _A Ravenclaw_ , he thought. _Roger something._ The dark-haired wizard was staring at him with barely-controlled contempt. Uncharacteristically worked-up: a temper like that was more of a Gryffindor trait.

Theo kept his expression mild as he turned again to Shacklebolt. "Minister, then. Something I can do for you?"

Shacklebolt narrowed his eyes at him, and Theo felt a whisper of discomfort beneath his dark stare. _A mind of winter, Theo_ , he reminded himself of one of his father's favourite maxims. _A Nott must have a mind of winter_. He cocked his head slightly, holding the man's gaze and making his own open and engaged. The older wizard huffed a sigh, "Theodore Nott, do you know anything about the escape attempt of one Draco Lucius Malfoy, made yesterday evening the thirteenth of May?"

Theo frowned at him, "I beg your pardon, Minister?"

Shacklebolt eyed him for a moment further, then abruptly his shoulders dropped. "I did not think so. Davies, this is pointless."

"He's a murdering liar, just like the rest of them." Davies hissed, "And he and Malfoy were thick as thieves."

"Be that as it may," Shacklebolt's tone held a note of finality, "I think if it were a coordinated attempt then we would either have two death certificates to issue, or this little visit would be enough to inform young Master Nott that such a thing is pointless."

Theo blinked, "Draco's dead?"

"Blew himself up trying to dismantle one of the wards on his cell," Davies wasn't even trying to mask the satisfaction in his voice, "Best not to try it, Nott. We wouldn't want you to miss your trial."

Theo ignored the Ravenclaw. Presumably someone close to Davies had fallen victim to the Dark Lord, but Theo didn't care for his lack of control. He addressed himself to the newly-minted Minister, thinking of the Inquisitorial warding. "How is that even possible?"

Shacklebolt scowled, "These holding cells are ancient. Some of the wards are unstable, and Malfoy appears to have been unlucky with the one he managed to trigger." The man's mouth twisted in distaste, "There was hardly anything left once we got the fire out."

Keeping his face neutral required all of Theo's considerable self-discipline. At least one of the spells on his cell was finished with his blood, which meant that it was new, and since it was easily the most elaborate of the wardings and was designed to prevent any harm coming to him whilst inside the cell that made it unlikely that whoever had cast it would have left the other wards in a state of degradation that could cause him injury.

But apparently the same level of care hadn't been taken over Malfoy's confinement.

Theo felt a prickle of unease. With Voldemort dead he had been coolly resigned to a sentence in Azkaban; perhaps ten years, less with good behaviour. With the Dementors gone it would be bearable. And then, once released, repair without fuss to the Continent and his family's German holdings. Publish some research papers using his mother's maiden name. Nothing showy. A quiet existence: no politics, none of the mania over blood purity. He could probably even get away with marrying a half-blood.

Only it would seem that somebody wanted him alive badly enough to perform complex and illegal magics right under the noses of the most senior wizards in the Ministry of Magic. Theo felt fear and unease gnaw at him, and he pressed one hand to the wall, feeling the magic whisper to life beneath his skin. He didn't recognise the magical signature of the wards, which hopefully precluded them being laid by a known enemy. _Small comfort_ , he thought, as the walls seemed to press close around him.

"When is my trial set for?" he asked, as Shacklebolt and Davies turned to leave, relieved that his voice was low and even.

The Minister glanced disinterestedly at him over his shoulder. "With everything to be done in the wake of Voldemort's fall the Wizengamot can be convened only once every few days. These things take time, and I'm afraid that you are some way down the list."

Theo's jaw worked. It hadn't occurred to him that he might be in the cell longer than a couple of weeks more. "How long?" he asked again, the note of strain audible to all in the room.

It was Davies who answered with a sneer as he followed Shacklebolt out of the door, "I'd get nice and comfortable in here, Nott. You'll probably be calling it home for the next few months."

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 _ **A/N:** Any thoughts, any reactions very much welcomed. Will be updated weekly on Wednesdays._


	2. Chapter 2

**2: Bind**

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As the chains tightened around his arms Theo realised that his hands were shaking and it was awful and infuriating and it _had to stop,_ so he curled them into fists at his sides and relished the pain where his overlong nails dug into the flesh of his palms.

Away from his cell - away from the _damn fucking_ wards - his blood flowed freely and Theo found it was a relief to know that he could hurt still. He wondered if he had started to go a little mad as he looked up at the assembled Wizengamot. After so long in the gloom the light of the courtroom, low though it was, was almost blinding and he was forced to choose between squinting or tearing up against it. The former seemed preferable; less likely to be mistaken for fear.

 _A Nott didn't show fear._

Theo turned his eyes towards the grey-flagged floor and kept his face blank as the red-headed clerk read the list of his crimes to the gathered witches and wizards:

"Consorting with the Dark Arts. Use of Unforgivable Curses. Membership of the terrorist organisation known as 'The Death Eaters'. Assault. Torture. Murder."

Theo sat still and let the words wash over him. It didn't matter what he was or wasn't guilty of: words were empty things, with nothing in them of the darkness of the deeds. The darkness that bled across his tortured dreams and sent him gasping into wakefulness.

 _A Nott endured even his nightmares in silence._

The Chief Warlock was an elderly wizard with hair that stood out in ludicrous white clouds but whose eyes were sharp and shrewd. _Doge_ , Theo thought, the name carrying the inflection of his father's disdain. Theo could feel those eyes boring into the top of his head even as he kept his own on the ground. Finally the old man's wheezy voice echoed through the chamber, "Will anyone speak for the Defence?"

A formality: Theo had heard the guards talk. He didn't need a Mark on his arm for them to issue him a one-way ticket to Azkaban.

He was focused so intently on the floor that he thought for a moment that he had imagined it when a quiet, clear voice spoke from behind him: "I will."

Theo felt his magic twist inside him at the sound of her, saw his wand arm flex against its chains and stilled himself before he could show any other sign of disquiet.

 _A Nott was made of ice; a Nott could not be surprised; a Nott was always in control._

He forced himself to keep his eyes on the ground, imagining the looks of shock on the faces of the witches and wizards ranged above him as the girl - the woman - stepped forward. He could see her shadow on the floor in front of him, stretching ahead of her where she stood just out of sight on his right hand side, like the angel perched upon men's shoulders in old stories.

 _A Nott cared nothing for superstition._

"You will speak in defence of the prisoner?" Doge's quavering voice was uncertain, with an edge of distaste.

"I will speak for him, yes." She took another step forward and as she came into his field of vision Theo finally lifted his head and stared, disbelieving, at the back of hers. Stared at the river of golden-brown curls that poured between her shoulderblades. Her head was held high and she stood straight and proud. He would have been willing to bet that at that moment he was the only person who could see the minute tension in the set of her spine.

He dropped his eyes back to the floor.

"Very...well…very well then." Doge sounded put out, and Theo heard a murmur rise around the chamber, a susurration of scandalised whispers before the old man spoke again. "You have heard the charges; what defence do you present?"

"Not a defence as such, sir." She paused as the whispers erupted once more, waiting calmly for them to die down. "But I would ask that Nott's sentence be commuted so that his skills might be put to the service of the Wizarding World."

Theo swallowed hard. He wasn't sure whether he liked the sound of that, but suddenly her presence seemed less like a bizarre joke.

 _She had a use for him_.

 _He might not have to go to Azkaban_.

He could feel his heartbeat speeding up, feel the unlooked-for bloom of hope spreading through his body and making him feel suddenly alive in a way that he had almost forgotten during the long months of confinement.

Theo kept his eyes down as she began to argue with the assembled Wizengamot, barely recognising the picture of him that she painted. She stressed his ingenuity, his brilliance, his shrewdness, his youth. The lack of anything but the slimmest of proof of his guilt.

 _Guilt_. Gnawing in his stomach. He chanced a look at the shine of her hair and wanted to be sick. _Guilt_.

She started talking about some project that was being undertaken here at the Ministry, something that he could apparently help with, but Theo had stopped listening to the individual words. He just let her quiet voice wash over him, the only gentleness that he had known in months. In years.

Let her draw him as a victim of circumstance. He didn't care anymore.

 _Guilt._

 _A Nott need make no apology for his actions._

The back and forth lasted for hours, and he began to feel light-headed. Her voice drifted at the edge of his consciousness as his chin dropped towards his chest. He wasn't sure when he'd last slept, when he'd last eaten. Only when the sharp crack of a gavel rang through the chamber did Theo come back to himself.

Doge cleared his throat, banging his gavel again. Theo couldn't stop his flinch at the sound, closing his eyes and shrinking into the stiff-backed chair. He heard her make a soft noise in her throat and felt his hands clench.

The clerk stood to read the results of the vote, and Theo was unsurprised to learn that he had been found guilty by unanimous assent. Thoros Nott's son: his name was a sentence in itself.

But then the clerk read the results of the second vote, and Theo felt dawning disbelief at the numbers. 37 – 12 in favour of commutation. His head spun momentarily with giddy stupefaction and he tried to breathe deeply, tried to stay calm and controlled as shouts of outrage erupted from the public gallery.

When Doge smashed his gavel down a third time, with a shout of " _Order!_ " Theo bit his lip until he tasted blood. He raised his gaze from the floor to stare at the ranks of purple-robed witches and wizards assembled above him, and snuck a look at _her_ from the corner of his eye as his fate was sealed.

"Theodore Nott, the Wizengamot does hereby find you guilty of the crimes of which you stand accused." Doge's overgrown eyebrows pulled together into a frown, his nose wrinkling as he continued: "However, it is the decree of this court that your sentence be shall be commuted. That your wand shall be returned to you, subject to weekly checks. And," pausing to glare over the top of his spectacles, "That you shall be released into the custody of Miss Hermione Jean Granger, once you have sworn an Unbreakable Vow to aid her in her work."

Not free. Captivity by any other name; Theo felt a strange sense of relief at the thought. It made sense - was, in fact, what he would have expected, had he expected any of this. But he would be out of the cell. Away from the blood wards.

And bound by Unbreakable Vow to the muggle-born witch.

He fought the need to look at her, imagining his father's imperious fury.

 _A Nott does not debase himself with those of impure blood_.

Strange how the aphorisms that Thoros had drilled into him, and that he had clung to while he was locked away in the dark, seemed to matter so little.

But then Theo had always had difficulty caring about blood status, even before the Dark Lord's defeat.

The Chief Warlock grimaced, "Do you, Theodore Nott, accept the terms of your sentencing?"

Theo's eyes skipped to her back, saw the tension in it again, and tried to clear his throat. When he spoke his voice was a dry whisper, "I do."

She turned to look at him then and finally Theo gave in, letting his gaze roam across her face. He took in her large, chocolate brown eyes; the fall of the light across her honey-coloured skin; the dusting of freckles over her nose.

The way her mouth lifted on one side like a question, or a promise, or the barest hint of a smile.

 _A Nott must have a mind of winter._ His father's voice slithered through his memory.

But Hermione Granger's eyes warmed him like the first breath of spring.

 **OOOOO**

Hearing Nott's whispered assent, Hermione felt a wave of relief and realised how much she had been dreading a refusal. She turned towards him, noting that aside from anything else he was far too thin. He finally met her gaze and Hermione had to suppress a shiver. The Theodore Nott that she remembered from her NEWT classes in sixth year had a kind face - had seemed always to be on the edge of making a joke. The man chained to the chair before her had murder in those shadowed, hazel eyes. A little voice in her head that sounded very much like Professor McGonagall whispered to her that she was taking an ridiculous risk and it couldn't possibly be worth it.

Hermione gave herself a mental shake, forcing herself to remember what was at stake - what they all stood to lose - and grit her teeth to meet Nott's eye. It hadn't been easy, scrambling to assemble a case for his release these last few months, but it was the right thing, the _only_ thing, to do. She needed Theodore Nott alive. They all did.

Chief Warlock Doge cleared his throat and one of the hooded Ministry wizards who ringed the edges of the stone chamber moved forward, wand at the ready. Hermione gathered herself and stepped towards the wary, watchful man in the chair. The shadows beneath Nott's eyes were so deep that he looked bruised and she couldn't help the pity that welled up in her. His eyes burned as they held her gaze, and something flickered in the opaline depths of green and amber: something defiant and angry and broken. She took a deep breath, nodding to the Ministry wizard before he waved his wand and the chains snaked back from Nott's arms, revealing the angry red welts that they had left in his flesh.

Hermione tried not to notice, stamped down on her instinct to deride the injustice. She could save her words for now; there was too much at stake.

Nott rose from the chair and knelt, eyes not moving from hers as he held up his right hand. Hermione grit her teeth and sank to her knees, placing her hand in his. Some part of her had expected him to flinch away from the contact - from the unclean touch of a Mudblood - but he didn't move, just watched her carefully. His hand was cool and dry, but Hermione could feel the way his magic coursed beneath his skin, and the way that hers danced in answer. When he closed his long fingers around hers they were gentle, but she could feel the strength in them.

 _And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss._ A half-remembered whisper in her treacherous mind. Hermione closed her eyes and swallowed.

Summoning all her reserves of steel she blinked her eyes open, to see Nott watching her closely. She forced herself not to look away, trying to communicate her own promise to him even as he was forced to swear himself to her. The hooded Ministry wizard lifted his wand, and Hermione spoke the words that she had memorised after weeks agonising over them.

"Will you, Theodore Nott, serve me loyally in my work and abide by my commands?"

Nott's throat worked before he spoke. His voice was a painful, disused rasp, "I will." A whispering thread of flame licked from the Ministry wizard's wand and twined about their clasped hands.

"Will you place your magic and your learning at my disposal?"

"I will." Another strand of flame.

"And will you grant me the fealty of your wand until such time as I should see fit to release you from this vow, or until you are released by your own natural death?"

She saw him frown minutely, the tiniest twitching together of his dark brows, but then - "I will."

A third flame joined the others, and at Hermione's nod the wizard standing over them made a complicated gesture with his wand. The swirling threads glowed brightly for a moment and she felt Nott's fingers clench slightly around hers, then the flames sank into the skin of their clasped hands.

Nott released his grip before she did, and Hermione had to stop herself from jerking her hand back in embarrassment. The young man gave her a long, assessing look, his generous mouth set in a hard line. She knew what had unsettled him, of course – it was hardly _pro forma_ to include a clause about releasing someone from an Unbreakable Vow. Bill had helped her get the wording right, as soon as he'd finished telling her she'd gone off the deep end to include the clause at all. The eldest Weasley brother was used to working with notoriously slippery goblins and Hermione trusted him to ensure that she constructed a Vow that answered her needs.

It was the only way, she reminded herself. That much had become clear during the months that they had spent securing the votes. The only way to ensure that Theodore Nott could be released as an asset to the future of the Wizarding World and was not doomed to live out his days with his brilliant mind slowly turning upon itself in the misery of Azkaban. Hermione shuddered at the thought and blinked, breaking the long moment in which they had held one another's gaze. When she opened her eyes again Nott's had narrowed almost imperceptibly, continuing to study her carefully.

He stood suddenly with an unexpectedly fluid movement, extending a hand to help her up. Unthinkingly, Hermione placed her hand back in his and let him pull her to her feet. He towered over her, she realised, her heart thudding suddenly as she stepped back from him. Nott's eyes remained slightly narrowed, but then he dredged a cold smile from somewhere and swept her a bow that was elegant, if a little unsteady, his right hand lifting to cover his heart as his left held his tatty prison robes out to one side in a mocking pastiche of a courtier's cloak. "My lady. What is your will?"

 **OOOOO**

The Vow had been strangely worded, and he didn't know why. Theo knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Hermione Granger was more than bright enough to ensure that she bound him exactly as tightly as she wanted, so _w_ _hy_ would she give him a potential out?

Easier to ponder this than to allow himself to go dizzy with the feeling of a hand in his. Skin against skin. When had he last been touched?

And now he was sworn to her. The last scion of the House of Nott, sworn in service to a muggle-born.

 _Mudblood!_ His father screamed, _Filth!_ Theo clenched his jaw and tried to block out the memory.

Because she was not just any muggle-born, he knew. Theo had felt the way that her magic had swirled and flared as soon as their palms touched, and it had been all but impossible for him not to recognise the signature - the same as on the illegal blood wards on his cell. He'd managed to hide his surprise as she'd placed her hand to his but Theo burned for an explanation. However, he wasn't yet so far gone that he didn't realise that this was neither the time nor the place, so as he rose to his feet he considered another development.

Granger had shown no distaste at his touch, but as soon as she had demanded his servitude he had seen guilt flicker in her eyes.

Guilt, Theo recognised. Guilt and he had become well acquainted with one another. And if Hermione Granger felt guilty then it would be remiss of him not to push her.

 _Not free_ , Theo thought _,_ _but not quite yet dead_.

He decided not to have the debate with himself as to why the idea of getting under her skin was so appealing.

Seeing the expression of horror on her face when he glanced up from his bow Theo felt the unfamiliar desire to laugh, and he let a little of that humour enter the smile that he had plastered across his face. Her gaze burned, assessing him in the same way that he had her just moments before. Then the upward lift of her mouth set in an expression that Theo read as _challenge_ , and she lifted her nose imperiously.

 _Where did that awkward little Muggle-born girl go?_ he wondered, as she stepped forward with all the authority of a witch born to the wand and put out her hand for him to kiss. "You will escort me out, Nott."

 _Who in the name of Salazar Slytherin had gone and taught her Pureblood manners?_ She could have been Narcissa Malfoy as she let him brush his dry lips over her knuckles, accepting the symbolic gesture of fealty with a bored disdain a world away from the apprehension of mere moments ago, before resting her hand lightly on his upturned palm and allowing him to sweep her out of the Wizengamot chamber, the whispers rising to a hubbub of excited chatter as the great stone doors swung closed behind them.

Granger dropped his hand the moment they were outside, and Theo felt himself shrink into the shadows, his eyes flickering darting up and down the corridor. Doors stood open at both ends. _Doors. Exit. Escape_. Granger's eyes followed his and her mouth turned down at the corners, the fury in her gaze softening just a touch. "You can't pull a stunt like that again, do you understand me, Nott?" Her voice was low, urgent, still aglow with the dying embers of her anger.

Theo wanted to shout - wanted the lash of her fury, of her revulsion. Instead he schooled his features into an expressionless mask. "Are you commanding my obedience in this, or will you simply cast a blood ward to ensure I am _unable_ to pull any stunts?" He gave a minute, artful pause, " _my lady._ "

A faint flush stained her cheeks, and Theo felt a thrill of triumph. "Just - just behave yourself, please. I promise I'll explain, but please stop calling me 'my lady.'"

Theo raised his eyebrows, affected innocent concern, "Was that a _command_ though, my lady? After all, you _are_ Hermione Granger, muggle-born darling of Gryffindor, are you not?"

Granger scrunched her eyes shut in frustration and Theo watched as she inhaled deeply through her nose. He felt dizzy, unreal, almost hysterical with tiredness. When Granger opened her eyes again she smiled sweetly at him and he felt a tingling rush of magic beneath his skin. Fear. Anticipation. _Why?_ He wanted to ask, _Why are you doing this?_

"Alright _,_ Nott _,_ have it your way." Her tone was lethally light, "You are commanded to address me as Hermione, or _if you must_ as Granger," she glanced up the corridor again, "Now, I command you to come with me so that we can collect your wand, after which I will be escorting you from the Ministry to somewhere where we can get you a bath and a hot meal and then discuss the terms of your release more privately."

Theo felt his brows twitch slightly, even as he fought to keep his face impassive. He could feel the pull of the Vow linking him to her words, to her orders, and while it was unpleasant it was certainly better than a stay in Azkaban would be. Granger folded her arms and cocked her head as though daring him to try and challenge her, still wearing that saccharine smile, and Theo could feel himself teetering, needing to push at her.

 _A Nott must have a mind of winter._

Compulsion licked its way across his tongue as he spoke. "Will that be all, _Hermione_?"

* * *

 _ **A/N:** As ever, please let me know what you think, and thank you to everyone who has read so far! Shout out to **Capecodcanal** , how could Harry wear anything BUT a Weasley jumper to defeat Voldemort?_

 _How Do You Solve A Problem Like Ginevra will be updated on Saturday; Sally Drabbles is ongoing (and feel free to send me a request); Nyctophilia will be back next Wednesday. Tomorrow is my birthday so love to everyone *throws flowers*._


	3. Chapter 3

_**A/N:** Psst...surprise!  
 **Warning:** contains references to past abuse_

* * *

 **3: Clasp**

* * *

"Where are we going?" he asked, as he tried to ignore the feel of her hand on his elbow, the grip just strong enough to discourage any attempt to break away.

Granger looked askance at him where Theo stood with his back pressed to the wall of the lift. He felt the way her eyes tracked the tension in his face and kept his gaze fixed resolutely on the doors.

Doors that would soon open, and beyond which would be people, and light, and noise, and spaces larger than what could be measured using hands and feet and -

"Department of Magical Law Enforcement." Granger's voice cut through his rising panic just as the doors slid open to reveal another narrow corridor and she stepped out, pulling him after her. It was quiet, but there was a pair of witches at one end who looked up from their conversation and stared as Granger tugged him along in the opposite direction. He felt their eyes sticking like cobwebs on his skin and forced himself to keep his face impassive.

As they turned the corner a sandy-haired man that he remembered as a Hufflepuff in their year at school passed them going the other way. "Hey!" Theo heard him call but Granger stalked onwards without so much as looking over her shoulder, and Theo told himself that he was not grateful.

He had thought for some reason that she would take him to the Auror office, which he had seen when Lucius had brought him and Draco to visit the Ministry once when they were small. Theo remembered being awed by the tall, imposing men and women who had regarded the two young boys with cool, impassive eyes.

When he had excitedly announced his ambition to be an Auror to his father upon his return home, Thoros had backhanded him so hard across the face that he had seen stars and tasted blood.

 _You are a Nott. You will not debase yourself as a Ministry attack dog._

But Granger walked right past the tall double doors, turning instead into a narrower section of hallway and finally stopping by a small, unremarkable door. There was a tiny label on it but Theo's eyes didn't have a chance to focus on the cramped handwriting before Granger was pushing the door open.

At first Theo thought that the small room beyond was empty, but then a voice called out from under one of the two desks that faced each other in the cupboard-like space.

"Hermione?"

Theo fought not to show his surprise when it was Potter who emerged; Potter who, once he had extricated himself from the furniture, gave him a slow, up-and-down stare; Potter who shared a long, wordless look with Granger that may as well have been a conversation lasting several hours before finally turning his eyes back to Theo.

"You agreed to swear the Vow then?" His voice was low, no hint of a taunt.

Theo nodded silently, not trusting his voice as he raked his eyes over the Boy Who Lived.

 _Lived. Lived and Draco died._

He bit the inside of his cheek and focussed on the fact that the so-called Chosen One still couldn't get his hair to lie flat. Not that Theo's frightful mop was any better, but he had the excuse of his sojourn at the Ministry's pleasure. Potter could at least have celebrated his victory over the Dark Lord by getting a decent fucking haircut.

Theo felt resentment pulse through him as he lifted his chin defiantly, emphasising the two or three inches that he had on Potter as he glowered down at him.

Beside him he heard Granger huff an impatient sigh. "Nott, this isn't the time. Just answer Harry properly."

Compulsion. Her words like strings pulling at him and Theo fought it long enough to smile his smooth, false smile at her; long enough to see her bristle; before he looked back at the other man. "I decided the Vow was probably better than Azkaban," he said. Potter gave a wince of pity at the sound of Theo's rasping voice and a stab of anger spurred his tongue onwards, "Even if I _did_ have to swear it to Miss Granger."

If he'd been expecting the other boy ( _Man_ , Theo corrected himself. _After everything, we're hardly boys anymore_ ) to take offence on Granger's behalf, he was disappointed. Potter simply blinked behind those stupid glasses of his, and then smiled slightly. "Well," he said, "We're all just _delighted_ by the prospect of having a new housemate."

 _Gryffindors_. The word was a groan inside Theo's head. _You don't have to rise to every bloody challenge_. Then the full implication of Potter's words settled over him and he frowned. Granger was bearable, but he was supposed to live with others too? "We?"

Granger glared at Potter, who widened his smile at her until she rolled her eyes. "Legally, you have to be resident where I am, and usually that's at Harry's house with him and uh-" she stopped abruptly. "Well, anyway. You'll spend the first few days with me at my parents' old house. Just until you're adjusted that is," she added, taking in Theo's wide-eyed gaze.

"Your...isn't that...won't that be...?"

"In Muggle London, yes," Granger said, her prim tone a warning. "But I've made my own adaptations. I'm sure you won't find it too alarming." She ignored Theo's splutter of protest to turn her glare back to Potter, twitching her head impatiently. Potter shrugged, still smiling, then slid open a drawer in the desk that he was now perched on and withdrew a wand that Theo recognised with a jolt as his own. The black-haired wizard passed it to him wordlessly and he closed his fingers around it with gentle reverence.

 _His wand. In his hand._

Acacia and phoenix feather: the feel of its familiar contours after so many months…for a moment he had to look away from where Potter and Granger both watched him, lest they saw the emotion in his eyes.

His magic purred through his veins, seeming to sigh with contentment, and beside him he felt Granger shift slightly.

When he looked down at her she was staring at his hand, white-knuckled around his wand, pale golden sparks dancing around his fingers. Theo closed his eyes, willed his control, and felt the energy dissipate before he consciously relaxed his grip. He tucked the wand through the string that served him as a belt, clenching his fist to hide the shaking in his fingers as he tried to sneer at her as nonchalantly as possible. She hardly needed to know how much it meant to him to have his wand returned to his possession, even if he had sworn it to her service.

Granger met his smirk with a stony expression, her shining eyes unsettling in their sharpness. Theo looked back at Potter, tried to make himself sound bored and aloof as he asked, "Am I to understand that you know why it is that Miss Granger was possessed by such a _strong_ desire to be my warden and keeper," he paused to cough roughly, his dry throat protesting at so many words. "To be my warden and keeper," he went on, "that she took it upon herself to play fast and loose with the ban on blood wards in keeping me out of Azkaban?"

After a beat of stunned silence Potter laughed openly, "I didn't believe that you'd figure it out." His green eyes flickered over Granger, and a hint of worry entered his gaze as, voice turning serious, he continued, "We weren't sure how long it would take to get you out, so we just had to keep you as safe as possible, and the wards were the best we could do with so little time." Theo glanced at Hermione, seeing her lips purse and recognising slight annoyance. Those wards were fucking complicated magic; he had no idea how she had managed to cast them before they got him into the cell.

Potter was still talking, and Theo turned back to him. "Hermione's the only one with enough grasp of wizarding law to have been able to argue your case, so it had to be her that you were sworn to." Potter's voice turned hard, "But don't you think for a moment that _I_ won't personally march you straight to Azkaban if you take it upon yourself to put even a toe out of line, Nott." Granger made a faint sound of protest at the sudden harshness of Potter's tone and Theo huffed an impatient exhale through his nose.

"Do you not understand how an Unbreakable Vow works, Potter?" he asked, pausing to swallow again as irritation made his voice crack over the other man's name. "I think that _may_ have scuppered my plans of daring escape for the time being." He dropped his eyes to the floor, heard the bleakness of the words as he whispered, "And anyway, I heard what happened to Draco."

 _Repeatedly_ , he did not add. His guards had enjoyed jeering at him with increasingly lurid stories of the mess created when Draco had triggered his wards. Theo had tuned them out dully and the taunting had finally stopped when the guards grew tired of his lack of reaction. He had learned very young not to rise to provocation, only allowing himself to grieve in the deep darkness of the underground nighttime, sobs choked behind his own hands, pressed tight against his gasping mouth.

He and Draco had grown up in each other's pockets. Theo - darker, quieter, more circumspect - had been content to fade into the shadows cast by Draco's strutting brilliance, though the Malfoy heir still had a singular gift for managing to get them both in trouble with their parents. It was the summer after his third year, which Draco had spent the majority of wailing about the gamekeeper's promotion to professor, when Thoros had removed his belt and beaten Theo so badly the house elves had run out of Dittany. He still had an ugly scar across one shoulderblade from the buckle.

 _"Lucius's errant boy," Thoros had spat, "is a spoiled, headstrong brat, and it will be his undoing."_

He hated that Thoros had been right. Hated that there was a part of him that wondered whether, if he had heeded his father's warning to keep his distance from Draco, Theo wouldn't feel such desperate despair at his friend's death.

 _Allies are better than friends, Theodore. Do not forget that._

At the whisper of grief when he said Draco's name, Potter and Granger had exchanged another of their long, inscrutable looks. Theo saw something flicker in the black-haired wizard's face, even as he fought to strangle his own emotions. "What happened to Malfoy was...unfortunate," Potter said finally. "It… I understand it's been very hard on Narcissa."

Theo frowned at him in confusion, "Why would you know anything about Narcissa Malfoy?"

Potter's cheeks flushed slightly and Theo's gaze slipped back to Granger, who tipped her chin as though daring him to ask further questions. _Pureblood manners_ , Theo thought, _where did she learn pureblood manners?_

He wanted to challenge her, wanted to shake his arm free of her grip, pull his wand from his belt and curse the pair of them, but even at the thought he felt the Vow flexing its grip around his wrists.

All at once the air in the room was too thick, and the dirt that covered his skin _itched_. A wave of revulsion threatened to engulf him and he forcibly distracted himself by meeting Granger's exasperated glare head on.

Whatever she saw in his eyes made Granger pause, and when she spoke next the caustic note that her voice had held before had gentled: "There's enough death and division without us adding to it, Nott."

She paused, almost smiled at him, and didn't move her gaze from his as she addressed her friend, "Harry, I think that we'll head back to mine now." Once again, her eyes catalogued Theo's face. "I'd prefer Nott cleaned up and fed before I try to explain anything more." Finally she turned her eyes away, and Theo tried not to notice how it felt like the shadows around him had deepened. "I'll send you an owl tomorrow morning?"

Potter nodded, "If you're sure you'll be alright." He cast a quick look at Theo, who forced himself to hold his level gaze, pretending not to notice the pity that had returned to Potter's green eyes. "Anything you want me to tell…?"

Granger looked up over her shoulder at Theo before shaking her head and pulling on his arm once again to lead him back through the door and along the now-deserted hallway to the lift.

Theo tried to focus on the frustrating gaps in what they had said, telling himself that he didn't notice how perfectly Granger's small hand fit into the crook of his elbow, how her little finger brushed lightly against a patch of skin exposed by a hole in his ragged robes. How that tiny touch felt like warmth, felt like light.

He wanted to snatch his arm away. He wanted her to never let go.

 _A Nott must have a mind of winter._

Theo ground his teeth together and tried as hard as he could not to shudder as he followed her back into the lift.

 **OOOOO**

Nott was so tense that Hermione was afraid that he might explode before she got him out of the Ministry. At least he had put his wand away, she thought grimly as they rode the lift towards the Atrium and the apparition point there.

A few floors above the DMLE the lift stopped, the doors opening to reveal a small group of witches and wizards. One witch, talking over her shoulder, made to step in but was restrained by her colleague grabbing her arm, face slack with horror. An odd silence fell over the group, their eyes curious and fearful as the lift doors slid closed.

There was every chance that it would be worse, Hermione thought, when they reached the Atrium.

Finally the lift pinged their arrival, and the doors rattled open onto the large main room of the Ministry. It was dingy, and quiet, but nevertheless Hermione could sense Nott coiled tight as a spring. She watched his eyes flash quickly around the cavernous space, saw the corners of them tighten, and realised that the last time he would have been in a room of this size would have been the Battle of Hogwarts.

His control was impressive but still she could feel the tension in the way he held his arm and she found herself instinctively squeezing his elbow by way of reassurance as they stepped out of the lift. However hard he worked to needle her she had seen glimpses ever since they first locked eyes in the Wizengamot Chamber of the dark terror that he tried to bury under insouciance.

She knew - had been told - that Nott had had a rough time of things both before and during the War, but as she watched his eyes dart from one side of the room to the other she realised that she perhaps hadn't understood the extent of that suffering, and she bit down on her frustration that it had taken so long to get him free.

There were very few people in the main chamber, but those who were there paused and watched them as they made their way past the half-destroyed statue that had been left in its sorry state after the end of the Second Wizarding War. Hermione could only imagine what an odd pair they made: the Golden Girl and the Death Eater.

 _Not a Death Eater_ , she argued inside her head, _He never took the Mark_.

A hooded wizard attired like the guards in the Wizengamot chamber hurried past them, his hand briefly brushing against Hermione's. She glanced at Nott but he didn't seem to have noticed, eyes fixed and staring straight ahead. Hermione felt a disconcerting momentary gratitude that Nott was so obviously preoccupied with keeping himself on the near side of panic, as she tucked the square of paper into her sleeve. She could only explain so much at once.

They reached the low dais from which she would apparate them back to her house and Hermione grasped Nott's hand, trying to tamp down her surprise at the the feel of his fingers clasping hers just a little too tight as she looked up at his stony face. "I forgot to ask," she blurted, "You're alright with side-along apparition?"

A muscle in his cheek twitched as though he were fighting for control, but then he managed to press his mouth into that awful mockery of a smile again. "I am yours to command, Miss Granger."

The attitude was irritating but at least, she reasoned, it meant that he hadn't been completely broken by his time in prison. Hermione had seen the state of the Ministry cells, those windowless pits of stone, and the thought of prisoners like Nott locked away there for months on end filled her with horror.

 _One crusade at a time, Hermione_. She huffed her frustration as she concentrated on the narrow mews where she had grown up, and apparated the pair of them away.

It was unusually mild for February, sunshine gilding the remnants of a recent shower on the cobbles when they landed on her front doorstep. The rich scent of wet earth haunted the crisp air, a promise of the coming spring. Hermione felt Nott stumble awkwardly against her, heard him suck in a great, gasping breath. Alarmed that he might have somehow been splinched she turned to see him seemingly uninjured but blinking in the light, his hazel eyes very wide and his waxy skin bloodless, jaw clenched so tight it must have been painful.

"It's alright," she whispered unthinkingly, tightening her fingers around his and feeling the leap of magic between them. "It's going to be alright."

Nott snatched his fingers from hers and glared at her, a flash of anger so brilliant that Hermione had to force herself to hold his stare. The rawness of his gaze was unnerving - pure, animal fear making the different shards of colour in his eyes dance.

She held herself as still as she could, watching him struggle to get a handle on himself as he folded his long fingers into a white-knuckled fist at his chest and closed his eyes.

"Why?" Nott asked finally, eyes still closed, his rough voice spitting the word at her like an accusation. "Why are you doing this?"

Hermione could hear the pain beneath the anger and she sighed, shoulders drooping, before she answered him. "Because we need your help, Theo." She saw him flinch at the sound of his name, the first time that she had said it, and she had the mad desire to reach out and smooth that awful hair from his forehead.

Slowly Nott's face relaxed and eventually he gave a nod, lips pressed tight together. Hermione waited a moment to see if he would say anything else, but when he opened his eyes they were once more inscrutable, his face rearranged into a careful blank.

She sighed again, running a hand through her own hair before stepping past him to unlock the door.

 **OOOOO**

Somehow Theodore Nott had escaped Hermione's notice almost entirely until they had started their sixth year at Hogwarts, when suddenly the tall, quiet Slytherin boy was in all her N.E.W.T. classes, giving her a run for her money in every subject.

She remembered their first Potions class with Professor Slughorn, how a quiet warmth had bloomed through her body when Theo had held her curious gaze. How seeing him turn away and laugh at whatever Malfoy had said about her blood status had made her feel the cool weight of humiliated disappointment.

But then he'd watched her; she'd felt him watching her. In Charms; in Transfiguration; in Defence. He watched her in Ancient Runes and in Arithmancy and he watched her in Potions.

And then one day, after completing a particularly tricky bit of non-verbal transfiguration and turning a handful of sand into a spray of water in mid-air, she had looked up and caught his eye once more. And impassive, watchful Theodore Nott had smiled at her - a wide, bright, genuine smile of congratulation - and had said, "Nice one, Granger."

The brittle man for whose freedom she had bargained, with fear and violence dancing in his eyes, was a thousand miles from that radiant boy.

* * *

 _ **A/N:** So I got this written much more quickly than I was expecting and didn't want to ruin it with too much fiddling, so a couple of days ahead of schedule! I will cautiously say that I may be updating more than weekly, but we'll keep that as a minimum standard. Next chapter therefore on, or before, 1st August._

 _In the meantime I am very much enjoying the amount of detective work going on in reviews - thank you so much for reading and hope I am managing to keep you on your toes!_


	4. Chapter 4

_**A/N:** I'm ahead of schedule on this, so rather than destroy it with fiddling about, an early post. _

* * *

**4: Balm**

* * *

Theo felt the pull of protective wards as he stepped across the threshold and into Granger's house - a momentary buzzing between his ears, a sizzle between his shoulders, and then he was inside, standing behind Granger in a narrow, cream-painted hallway that smelled soft and clean and feminine.

The paint on the walls was fresh, he thought, and lifted a hand towards one, fascinated by something so immaculate. He paused at the sight of the dirt embedded in his knuckles and dropped his hand abruptly to his side. He didn't want to lose the fragile equilibrium that was only just returning to him after the humiliating episode on the doorstep, and so he curled his hands into his robes as he looked about himself with guarded curiosity.

Some muggle works of art (nothing remarkable as far as he could tell) hung on the walls, and a few pairs of shoes so small that they could only belong to Granger sat beneath a couple of travelling cloaks hanging from hooks. Through an archway Theo could see a bright, modern-looking kitchen, and ahead of him a staircase in light wood led to the upper floors.

Granger rested her hand lightly on a simple wooden sideboard and opened her mouth as though to speak. Theo waited, but Granger seemed to think better of it and instead started up the stairs wordlessly. Theo followed, past the comfortable, book-lined sitting room that took up the whole of the first floor and then up to a small landing and into the bedroom that occupied the second.

Again the light-blue walls looked freshly painted, and the iron-framed bed had been made up in plain white cotton. Against one wall was a pine wardrobe and there was a door that Theo assumed led to a bathroom.

"This was my parents' bedroom." Granger's soft voice made him jump and Theo cursed himself silently as he glimpsed the worry that ghosted over her face at the sight. She frowned slightly before continuing, "I hope it will be alright for you. There's a shower and bath through there. Clothes in the wardrobe," she sighed, "Mostly old muggle stuff of my dad's, I'm afraid, but it's better than what you have."

Granger paused, eyeing Theo critically. "Leave those robes on the floor, I'll get rid of them later." Her gaze raked over his hair and face, "There's shaving stuff and scissors so that you can give your hair a trim if you want to, but the room isn't warded so I - I forbid you to hurt yourself." Theo felt his mouth twist involuntarily at the thought and he cocked his head, wondering if she would say anything more, but Granger was turning away, clearly embarrassed by the order she had given and what it implied.

He gambled, not wanting her to leave and determined to unsettle her as much as she unsettled him: "Would you like me to strip off while you wait, or am I to be allowed some privacy?"

At his words she swung back to gape at him, eyes wide and cheeks flaming. Theo lifted his eyebrows expectantly and swept a hand across himself, relishing his ability to tip the scales of this strange new alliance but trying not to betray his enjoyment of her flustered state and of his victory.

"No – gosh – I – no." Granger goggled at him a moment, then abruptly spun on her heel, speaking over her shoulder as she left the room, "I'm going to have a shower too – my room's upstairs – then I'll make us something to eat and we can - you can - I..."

She was babbling, Theo thought, pleased that he'd managed to throw her so far off-balance.

He thought that she would leave then, but Granger paused in the doorway, hand on the white-glossed wood of the frame, gaze fixed to it rather than looking at him as she took a deep breath. "Take as long as you need, Nott, and if you want to sleep or anything that's fine because you must be – it's – whatever you need." Her voice calmer, she finally looked up at him again, "I want you to feel at home here. You're bound to me by your Vow, but I don't want to make you…I don't want to be…you've been locked up too long as it is." She nodded, seemingly to herself, and then slipped from the room, closing the door behind her.

Theo stood in the centre of the room and closed his eyes. It smelled of her, the house. Parchment and coffee and something like Narcissa Malfoy's rose garden after heavy rain. A smell that belonged to Granger and nobody else. He tried to ignore the way that a small knot of the tension inside him had unwound itself at the blatant fact of her living here alone.

 _But she doesn't live here normally_ , he remembered. _She lives with Potter and whoever else is holed up in whatever terrible Gryffindor nightmare it is that he calls home_. He felt a stab of jealousy and shook his head to free himself of that pointless line of thinking. Granger was an upstart know-it-all who just happened to be very pretty. That was all.

He jumped again when he heard the floorboards creak above his head, before he remembered that the upstart know-it-all in question had said that her bedroom was upstairs. He ground his teeth and began to strip off his filthy prison robes, leaving them, as directed, in a pile on the floor.

Stepping into the bathroom he was assaulted by the sight of his own face in the mirror. Theo stopped and stared, horrified, at the man before him.

He was thin almost to the point of gauntness, all sharp bones and scrawny muscle. His hair was over-long and matted with dirt, his grimy face half-covered by a mangy-looking beard. Theo knew objectively that under the muck he still looked much the same as ever, his features perhaps even thrown into sharper relief by the new hollows in his face, but all he could see was the dirt, the shadows that coated him.

 _How could she bear to even touch him?_

He lifted the scissors from where they sat on the edge of the sink and opened them, pressing a blade against his unblemished forearm. How many times had he tried to cut into it with his nails during the months in the cell?

But this - this wasn't like the strange warding that Granger had laid over the old stones. Instead, he felt the stinging, twisting pull of the Vow jerking his fingers, his hand moving as though of its own volition to lift the scissors away and close them before he could so much as break the skin.

Theo's mouth tightened slightly at the proof of Granger's power over him but it was better than before. At least he had heard her command. At least he knew the face of his jailer.

He hacked away the worst clumps of hair, letting them fall into the sink before he lifted his wand. Theo swallowed, closed his eyes and summoned his will into a croaked " _Evanesco_ ". He felt warmth trip through his fingers, and when he squinted one eye open he was more relieved than he could say to find that the charm had worked. He'd kept up his practise of basic wandless magic while imprisoned, but there was a precision and grace to using a wand that he had been afraid might be slow to come back to him.

He set the slim rod of acacia wood down beside the sink before pulling off his underwear and stepping into the shower cubicle. " _Operis_ " he whispered, looking at the strange muggle faucet, and then the heavenly warmth of the water was falling over his shoulders, taking with it the accumulated filth of months in prison.

Theo watched the black water swirl towards the plughole, trying to ignore the shaking of his shoulders.

 _A Nott must have a mind of winter._

He didn't make a sound, just braced his palms on the wall as his body was wracked by great, silent sobs, letting the water wash over him as though it would cleanse his very soul.

 **OOOOO**

Hermione heard the rattling clunk of the old pipes coming to life and sighed her relief, sinking onto her bed. She swept a hand across her face, only realising that she was crying when she felt the wetness on her fingers, and cursed herself for a fool. Tears wouldn't help anything, and it certainly wouldn't do to let Nott see a hint of weakness. She had a feeling that if she gave a proverbial inch…

She gave herself a little shake, and pulled the parchment from her pocket, smoothing it flat on her lap. _First surprise inspection 3pm tomorrow. Unspeakables report no change._

3pm tomorrow. That gave her plenty of time to explain to Nott what the hell was going on.

Balling the note in her fist Hermione vanished it silently, before rising from the bed to busy herself with unbuttoning the formal robes that she had worn to the Ministry, shrugging off the heavy wool and hanging them neatly in her wardrobe. Free of the weight and stiff boning that were still in vogue among witches Hermione rolled her shoulders and cracked her aching neck. She heard the pipes clank again as the water downstairs was shut off and she stepped into her own bathroom, hoping that a shower might force her to relax.

Once her hair was wet through she lathered up the expensive French shampoo that had begun as a treat after their year on the lam, and had now become a ridiculous indulgence that she was unwilling to part with. Her hair didn't really need washing but the delicate, rosy scent always calmed her down and she needed to be doing something rather than just sitting downstairs and waiting for Nott to reappear.

Andromeda had assured her they had the votes, and Hermione had thrown every legal precedent in the book at the Wizengamot, but she still hadn't believed it even when Percy had read the result, when he had given her the barest wink over the top of the parchment. Even with her fingers curled around Nott's arm, even when Harry had passed him his wand, she hadn't believed it had worked. It was only when she'd seen Nott stood there in the room that it had taken them a weekend to repaint, because she and Harry insisted on doing it the muggle way, that she realised they really had got him out.

He had looked so terribly lost, so hopelessly forlorn, and then she'd gone and commanded him not to hurt himself and he had shuttered that vulnerability behind a twist of his wide, chapped lips.

 _Would you like me to strip off while you wait?_

Her cheeks flamed at the memory, and at the image that the offer had unexpectedly brought back to mind. Nott in the corridor waiting outside their sixth-year potions class, first thing in the morning, talking in a low voice to Draco. Large, slim hands cutting through the air. The way that he had flicked his wet hair out of his eyes and caught Hermione's where she'd been watching him. The way that he had glared at her.

He hadn't been the only watchful one.

Hermione opened her eyes and stared unseeingly at the tiled wall, thinking of the determined, challenging line of Nott's mouth and the flash of defiance in his eyes. It didn't matter whether hurting himself would have occurred to him before – if she didn't expressly command him not to now he would probably chop off a finger just to provoke her. All the while smiling that small, cold smile.

She growled in frustration as she rinsed the suds from her hair and reached for the Sleekeazy conditioning treatment that was still the only way that she could achieve anything but a rat's nest. She gnawed her lip as she smoothed it through her wet curls, mulling over the day's events and how she was going to explain everything to Nott. As though getting him out of custody hadn't been hard enough, now she had to get him to agree to help.

 _There's always the Vow, though._

Hermione shook her head, dismissing the thought. She had been furious when Percy had told them that an Unbreakable Vow would be the Ministry's compromise, and she refused to make Theo do anything against his will. She might as well have Imperiused him otherwise.

Of course, months of work to get him released would prove an exercise in futility if Nott didn't want anything to do with the whole sorry enterprise, but Hermione had been determined to leave him choice in the way that she worded the Vow. _Serve me loyally in my work_. That meant not obstruct her. _Place your magic and your learning at my disposal_. That meant answer her questions. Nothing more. And she would not command him do anything unless she had to.

 **OOOOO**

 _"Why does it have to be me?" she asked, glowering at them across the kitchen table._

 _It was Harry who answered, shifting uncomfortably beside her. "Because you're the only one who knows enough Magical Law to be able to defend him. They won't let Andromeda or Narcissa do it."_

 _"Why would he swear to me though?" Hermione protested, "Muggle-born, remember?"_

 _Andromeda sighed through her nose, sharing a look with Narcissa. "He will swear to you, because Theodore Nott will recognise that you are cleverer, more powerful and more wily than most wizards alive, in spite of the misfortune of your birth."_

 _Hermione curled her lip, ready to retort, but Andromeda batted an impatient hand through the air, "My Ted was muggle-born, Hermione. I know how these things are, and it has stood against you, has it not?" When Hermione flushed silently Andromeda continued her lecture, "Now you get to stand up and show everyone that you can play pureblood politics with the best of us. Theodore speaks that language. He will swear to you."_

 _She graced Hermione with the mischievous smile that Tonks had inherited, eyes flicking from Harry to the other young wizard at the table, who was also gaping openly at the exchange. "Voldemort took. The Ministry takes. It's time for us to take back." Andromeda's voice was like honey on a blade, no question in her tone as she exchanged a look with Narcissa. "In order to win, you have to play the game," Andromeda looked at Hermione again, "And Theodore will see that you are offering him a chance to be a player."_

 **OOOOO**

Hermione continued to work the potion gently through her hair, massaging her scalp with her fingers. Could she persuade him to help? Would she be persuaded, she wondered, if things were the other way around? She hoped that she, that Nott, would at least be curious enough to give things a chance. That didn't seem like very much to ask, she decided, nodding to herself as she started to rinse the Sleekeazy out.

Her mind wandered as the water ran down her back, and she lingered on the insolent set to Nott's jaw, the angry, daring gleam of his hazel eyes. She turned the faucet for cooler water, feeling suddenly too hot and relishing the goosebumps that the sudden cold raised on her arms as she pressed her forehead to the tile. He'd been filthy; there was only so much a scourgify could achieve, although it had at least taken care of the smell. And yet, and yet -

 _Those eyes_ , Hermione thought, _That mouth._

She shot her hand out and turned off the water with a jerk. This wasn't the time. The time was _never._

Grabbing her towel from the heated rail Hermione dried herself quickly, casting a wordless hot-air charm over her hair with a perfunctoriness that she knew would have made Narcissa wince. A quick rummage through her dresser produced jeans and a comfortable jersey top that she pulled on over her plain cotton underwear. Hermione wasn't much of a one for ceremony and she had retained a lot of her muggle habits in her own home.

As she tugged her curls into a thick plait she glanced quickly at the frame on her bedside table, where her parents grinned and waved in a picture taken in Australia. Hermione smiled sadly at it before she made her way downstairs to the kitchen.

Nott was sat calmly at the scrubbed wooden table, and Hermione almost did a double take when she saw him. He had washed and trimmed his hair, and the slightly damp chestnut locks curled softly, falling over his forehead and bringing out the green-blue in his hazel eyes, which already looked less sunken and bruised. Gone was the awful, scraggy mess of beard, but he had left himself something just beyond a five o'clock shadow, which accented the strong lines of his jaw and cheekbones.

He was wearing one of her father's old jumpers, the stretched-out crew neck drooping to lend a glimpse of the hollow of his collarbone, and the navy sleeves pushed up to reveal the slim muscles of his forearms, still graceful even after his imprisonment.

Overall, she decided that the effect of a clean, presentable Theodore Nott was just unfair, and Hermione found herself uncharacteristically self-conscious as she stood watching him from the doorway. Pulling awkwardly at the hem of her shirt, she suddenly realised that she was staring and blushed, turning quickly to the fridge and grabbing the tupperware of soup that she had made the night before in a bid to calm her nerves.

"I take it you approve, Miss Granger?"

 **OOOOO**

He saw Granger tense at his teasing tone and had to suppress the little thrill of anticipation as he waited for her angry retort. He was surprised when he saw her square her shoulders before she turned and smiled at him. "Much better, Nott. Now that you actually _look_ like a person I feel it will be much easier to treat you like one."

Theo bit back a snippy answer but couldn't help the way his eyes narrowed. Granger's gaze sparkled with triumph before she turned back to busy herself warming the soup up in a pan, her braid swinging behind her and releasing a faint hint of that rain-rose scent that made Theo's stomach clench.

 _Why did it have to be Hermione Granger?_ He wondered. _Why couldn't it have been anyone else?_

Theo watched her in silence for a minute as she sliced bread and put it in some sort of muggle device that then produced toast with a quiet _ping_. Eventually he felt himself being overtaken by uncharacteristic impatience, and decided that he'd waited long enough. "I assume that if it's my help that you need I will at least receive an explanation as to what you need it with?" He kept his tone civil, courteous, trying to give no hint of her effect upon him.

She had been slicing an apple, arranging the pieces between two plates, but replaced the knife carefully on the counter at his words. Before answering him she levitated bowls, plates, toast and soup to the table, setting everything down with perhaps more of a clatter than was necessary before slipping into the chair opposite him and folding her hands primly.

"Actually Nott, I remember saying that I would likely command that you had something to eat before I explained anything." She gestured at the saucepan and Theo, after far too long on prison rations, didn't bother to fight her before he ladled some of the broth into the bowl she had placed in front of him. He did notice that she had worded her answer so as to not _actually_ tell him to do anything.

He dipped a spoon into the soup, blowing gently on it before he tipped it into his mouth. It was thin and lightly seasoned, with little bits of chicken in it, and it tasted like heaven. Theo had to suppress a moan of pleasure and couldn't keep from closing his eyes for a moment, savouring the almost-forgotten flavours. He took a piece of toast and reached for another, but Granger's hand on his stopped him. "Take it easy," she said quietly, "You don't want to make yourself sick."

A hint of a smile pulled at her mouth, and Theo held her gaze as he swallowed before licking his teeth and allowing himself to grin back at her, a true smile that he knew crinkled the skin around his eyes and deepened the dimples in his cheeks. A smile that Pansy Parkinson had once told him was worthy of swooning over and should be deployed more often; only it was a smile that Theo rarely had use for.

Seeing the blush that his smile brought to Granger's cheeks, he wondered whether he might have found a use for it after all.

 _A Nott must have a mind of winter._

The memory of his father's twisted sneer, of his raised hand, crashed through his mind, and Theo felt his grin disappear abruptly. He finished his soup with a frown. "Willing to tell me now, or would you prefer me to perform a gymnastic routine for you first?"

Granger's cheeks turned faintly pink and she shrugged at him, "I guess it's just best to get it over with." She gave a little nod, almost to herself, and then looked Theo straight in the eye.

"How much do you know about the Department of Mysteries, Nott?"

* * *

 _ **A/N:** The BBC Mystery Drama continues! _


	5. Chapter 5

_**A/N:** What can I say, Theo and Hermione are speaking to me at the moment..._

* * *

 **5: Blade**

* * *

She hadn't expected it to be so difficult to tell him everything, but then she hadn't anticipated Nott being so very... _so very_.

The brilliant smile that he had flashed her had disappeared, but his glittering hazel eyes still held hers steadily and Hermione could feel the blood warming her face. He had managed, despite obviously being half-starved, to demonstrate impeccable table manners while eating the soup that she'd made, and the vague thought occurred to her that she should have given him a napkin. Narcissa and Andromeda would have been horrified.

As the memory of just one of the many lessons learned with the Black sisters over the last few months drifted across her mind Hermione gave herself a little shake. She'd been given a job to do, and there was no sense getting distracted by how nice Nott managed to look in a shapeless old jumper, or how the wounded wildness that occasionally flashed in his eyes made her heart ache.

She straightened her spine and stared coolly back at him. How to explain? She bit her lip, and dropped her gaze down to where her hands sat on the scrubbed pine of the table as, frowning, she sorted through her thoughts. _Start at the beginning, I guess_. She raised her eyes, studied the way the shadows clung beneath the bones of his face.

"...how much do you know about the Department of Mysteries, Nott?"

His hand had been inching across the table for another piece of dry toast but at her words Nott froze, fixing her with a penetrating stare. Hermione tried to get a read on the emotions that swirled in his vernal gaze but then he blinked and sat back, folding his arms even as those now-familiar walls sprang up in his eyes. The food was apparently forgotten. "The Department of Mysteries," he repeated slowly.

"I take it you're familiar?" She allowed one eyebrow to lift, turned her impatience into a tease as Narcissa had taught her. It was easier to tell what Nott was thinking when he was at war with himself, she realised, as she saw a whisper of amusement do battle with the mistrust in his eyes.

"Let's say that I am. What of it?" His voice was terse, though the scratch in it had been somewhat abated by the soup.

"Do you know what Voldemort was after when he tried to break into it?" she asked. Something in Nott's eyes flickered at this, the barest hint of unease at her use of the name.

"He - Vol - the Dark Lord," Nott spat the title, "He had control of the Ministry. Why would he need to break into the Department of Mysteries?"

"Well, why indeed," Hermione said, idly dabbing toastcrumbs from the tabletop with her finger. "The Unspeakables invoked an emergency protocol," she said softly, searching his face for a reaction, "When the Ministry fell."

Nott remained silent, so still he might have been petrified. Hermione let her eyes drift over his shoulder as though she was thinking hard about something, all the while aware of his intense focus upon her. "Voldemort had spies in every department, he was all set for a complete takeover, but somehow the Unspeakables outsmarted him."

"Rookwood." Nott said quietly. "He killed him."

"He killed all of them." Hermione met his eye once more, "Your Dark Lord really didn't like it when people defied him, did he?"

At this, Nott's mouth tightened and the storm of his gaze turned ominous, "Voldemort," he enunciated the name carefully, mouth twisting as though the very syllables carried a bitter taste. "Not _my_ Dark Lord. And no, he did not, as you are well aware."

Hermione swallowed, pressing on despite the prickle on the back of her neck at his icy tone. "Well, that being the case, with all the Unspeakables dead the whole Department is still sealed off. Which is a problem, because..." She paused, thinking how to phrase what she would say next. "It's...well...the Department of Mysteries is leaking."

Nott's eyebrows twitched together at this and Hermione saw the scepticism in his gaze sharpen into something closer to curiosity. "Pure magic," she went on hurriedly, "Neither light nor dark just - just energy, and it's getting stronger."

Nott cocked his head slightly, "How does the Ministry's inability to clean up its own mess have anything to do with you and Potter hatching some crackpot scheme to free me from captivity?"

He eyed her, face taut with suspicion, and Hermione sighed through her nose. _In for a knut_ , as the expression went. "Because the Ministry's gone to shit," she said, as bluntly as she could manage. "The Aurors fought against Voldemort in the end, but they had nearly a year to get a taste for blood while he was running things." She thought of Davies' cold smile, his casual dismissal of Malfoy's death. _One less to worry about_.

"There's corruption at every level," she went on, "It's why the Death Eater trials have been so drawn out." She felt her hand curl into a fist on the tabletop and dropped it into her lap, forcing herself to relax as Nott's eyes caught the movement. "They're making a spectacle of them to hide the fact that fifty percent of the current Ministry workforce collaborated readily." _If not more_.

"I thought Shacklebolt was Minister?" Nott said, "He was one of yours wasn't he?"

"Kingsley's one man." Hermione scowled, "There's over a thousand people working in the Ministry, so it's all that he can do just to keep order."

Nott's mouth twisted, "Fine. But none of this explains why you need me."

"Because you're clever," Hermione replied, "And you know your way around dark magic - " Nott made a faint sound of protest but she pressed on, "You _do_ , Nott, come on, I'm not an idiot. We're fighting blind here, so we could use your brains."

He glowered at her, "I'm not an idiot either, Granger. You want the library at Nott Manor."

Hermione bit her cheek, flushing slightly. "Yes," she said finally. "But I could have got access without you."

"So why bother with me," Nott's voice was urgent, his face twisting with confusion. "Why put yourself to the trouble? Why make me swear _that fucking Vow_?"

"Because you don't deserve Azkaban!"

She'd shouted it, and he flinched away as though she'd hit him, his chair rocking backwards before righting itself again. Hermione lifted a hand from her lap to smooth her hair, making the movement slow and careful, and noting absently that she was shaking. She closed her eyes and tried to calm herself down.

"You don't deserve Azkaban," she repeated in a whisper, "Your father…" When she looked at him Nott had that wild look in his eyes again and she reached her hand across the table towards him before she had fully thought what she was doing. "You shouldn't have to suffer for your father's actions, Theo. "

His eyes had been on her hand, regarding it like it was some sort of foreign creature, but at the sound of his name he raised them to her face. "Voldemort was trying to find a way back in to the Department of Mysteries," Hermione went on, holding his gaze steadily, "Narcissa got us the information that he'd managed to pull together but it isn't enough, and we don't know why he wanted to get in there, and frankly we need all the help we can get."

There was a long moment while they stared at each other across the table, then Nott exhaled slowly. "Who's we?" he said.

 **OOOOO**

Granger's eyes were careful, unwavering. Theo tried to ignore the rushing sound of his own blood in his ears. "Me," she said slowly, "Harry. A few others."

"Like who?" He hated the way that he'd reacted to her shouting, was determined not to let her rattle him further.

"That's not important right now."

Theo bit down on the urge to snap that he thought it _was_ important, actually, and instead wrestled a condescending smile onto his face. "Fine." He blinked slowly, languorously at her. "You want to get into the Department of Mysteries. What would you have me do, Miss Granger?"

Granger sat back, withdrawing her hand as she went. Theo dug his fingers into his arms to stop himself reaching out to snatch it.

"I would have you make yourself useful, Mr Nott."

Theo heard the tease, felt his breath catch and watched her smile sweetly at him as she twisted the upper hand in the conversation entirely beyond his grasp. Not that he'd ever really come close to having it.

The witch cocked her head and simpered and Theo's head spun. _Was she flirting with him?_ He somehow couldn't help the answering upturn of his lips, the tightening of the muscles in his stomach, and he watched the movement of Granger's mouth as she smiled again: the small, satisfied smile of someone who had just found the solution to a puzzle.

 _Ah,_ Theo thought. So it was a duel, then, nothing more. A battle of wills. The realisation was like cold water over his mind, equal parts relief and disappointment.

Duels were nothing new to him.

He bit his lip as though trying not to smile back, tipping his head slightly and pitching his voice low, "Useful, is it?" He needed to know what she knew, draw her out and - there now, the little twitch of her mouth rising to his bait. It was like having a conversation with one of the Greengrass sisters. Less malice, just as much trouble. _Where did she learn the steps to this dance?_

She'd mentioned Narcissa, again. _Why would Narcissa Malfoy be working with Potter and Granger?_

"Oh I definitely think that you could have your uses," Granger said, and her smile deepened when Theo allowed himself to raise an incredulous eyebrow, "After all, you did figure out the warding on your cell. I should imagine you'll be rather helpful in working out what the hell the Unspeakables did to seal the Department."

Theo couldn't help it, "Is that so?"

"Blood wards, Nott," Granger said, her eyes gleaming. "Whatever they did, it looks like a pretty fucking complex blood ward." Her mouth shaped the words so neatly that it took Theo a moment to realise she'd sworn.

 _She didn't learn that from Narcissa._ He smirked at the thought, and then his mind caught up with what she'd said and he stared at her as the pieces started to fall into place. This was old magic that she was talking about. Old and strange and unpredictable, far beyond light and dark. The type of magic that made your nerves sing and could drive you mad if you weren't careful.

The type that required…

"You're talking about working an Unravelment," Theo said slowly.

Granger quirked her eyebrows at him, seeming more pleased than surprised that he had caught on so quickly. "I am, yes."

Theo reached up and scratched his cheek just to have something to do as his mind struggled to process what he was hearing. _Unravelments_. He remembered, suddenly, a line from one of his father's books: _'The joining of bloods in a knotted ward can only be undone by an Unravelment of equal power.'_

But working that sort of magic took more than power, Theo knew. It demanded difference and balance and understanding. It needed dark and light; calm and storm. Instinct and connection and certainty. And they'd need to know how many Unspeakables had worked the warding together, the phase of the moon that it had been done beneath -

With effort Theo forced himself to slow down. _Plenty of time to think about all that. For now_ \- he narrowed his eyes at Granger. "Right. So I'm guessing that he, that Voldemort," he forced the name out, "Got that far. How come he didn't manage to work the Unravelment himself?" Theo's stomach gave a lurch at the thought. _All that power_. Would the Dark - _Voldemort_ , he told himself furiously - would Voldemort have won if he'd gained access to whatever the Unspeakables had wanted to hide from him?

Granger swallowed, her nerves finally showing as she spoke quickly, "Voldemort's followers conformed to a type," she said. "I doubt he truly trusted any of them." She ignored Theo's frown as she continued, "And an Unravelment…" she paused, chewing her lip, "You _need_ trust. You have to trust each other."

"Trust." Theo laughed, surprising himself with the sound as he lifted his hands to his face and chuckled helplessly. "You made me swear an Unbreakable Vow, Granger." _Mad_ , he thought. _Mad to even hope_. "Doesn't that make the concept of trust somewhat null and void?"

He blew out a breath and peered between his fingers to see her watching him with a hint of uncertainty, though she was poised and still. "You tell me, Nott," she whispered.

Even the rhetorical question tugged at him, and before he could bite his tongue Theo was speaking.

"I can't," he said honestly, "I've no idea."

Granger considered him for a moment. "Will you help?" Her voice was quiet, but the question filled the room. Her eyes pulled at him in a way that was quite distinct from the marionette-strings of the Vow.

Theo tipped his head. "If I refuse?"

Granger flinched slightly, but met his eyes without hesitation, "Then I would remind you of the terms of your Vow, and command your cooperation."

"Trust, in- _fucking-_ deed," Theo smirked, dropping his eyes and finally reaching for another piece of toast. Granger frowned at that, and Theo decided to be grateful for small victories even as he felt a treacherous longing to see her smile again.

 _A Nott must have a mind of winter._

 **OOOOO**

Nott ate the toast lazily, breaking it into pieces so cleanly that Hermione might have suspected that he was using a slicing charm if she hadn't been watching his every move.

His eyes were clear, focussed, and she had no doubt that he was working through the implications of everything that she had told him. It was a lot to take in, she knew, but Percy had shown her the copy he'd made of the arithmantics that Nott had managed to scrawl on the wall of his cell. He hadn't let himself get sloppy during his imprisonment, and he was more than bright enough to spot the flaw in the Vow she'd made him swear.

When he was finished he swiped a thumb across his lips and then sucked it clean as he considered her, before he silently rose from his chair, lifting his plate to carry it to the sink. As he stepped behind her Hermione held her breath, waiting to see what he would do.

The knife was a cold kiss against her throat, bringing with it a wave of déjà vu, and Hermione swallowed carefully, obeying the upward pressure that Nott applied and standing from her chair. His arm was tight around her shoulders, but he angled his body away from hers as though unwilling to touch her any more than necessary.

His warm breath tickled her ear, raising goosebumps over her entire body, "And if I say that this Unravelment idea can go and die with the - with Voldemort?" She heard the hitch in his voice, and couldn't help but admire the way he forced himself to say the name. "Will you command my cooperation anyway, if you've got it wrong?"

Hermione closed her eyes and forced herself to relax. "This sort of blood magic...what would be the point?"

Nott was very still behind her, his breath even. "But Miss Granger, whyever not?"

"Why feign ignorance, Nott?" She made her voice arch, mocking even. "You know as well as I do that you swore only your power - none of your cunning or intelligence. If I ordered you to help you'd be barely more than a blunt instrument."

She felt his cheek move against her hair and knew that he was smiling that cold, teasing smile. "Surely a blunt instrument is better than nothing?"

"We need a skeleton key, not a battering ram," Hermione whispered. "But more than anything I need a partner, not a tool." The gauntlet laid, she barely dared to breathe, hoping that the repeated assurances that Nott would be willing to work with her had been correct; that she hadn't wasted months of work assembling the case for his release.

Finally he released his hold and she swayed slightly on her feet, half falling before he caught her around her waist. Hermione's hands came up of their own volition to steady herself against his chest, feeling the tell-tale quickening of his heart underneath the taut muscle. She felt her own pulse jump to match it and forced herself to look up at him. "So I take it that's a yes?"

Nott made no move to step away, though she could feel the tension vibrating in his muscles as he looked down at her with calculating intent. "The fealty of my wand..." he murmured, eyes narrowing. Then - "You left the knife there deliberately."

When she said nothing he frowned, "Why go to all the trouble of the Vow?"

Hermione grimaced, "The Ministry would never have agreed without it."

Still he didn't relax his grip on her, and she felt the air thicken between them, saw Nott's pupils go wide and dark as she knew her own must be. When he raised his hand to skim a finger under her jaw she inhaled sharply, feeling the trail like a burn over her skin, allowing him to raise her chin just a little towards his face.

He smiled at her then, cold and almost feral, lifting his finger away to show her the scarlet on its tip.

"It all comes back to blood in the end, doesn't it, Hermione?" Her name was a mocking purr from his mouth. She swallowed hard, trying to stamp on the memories of Malfoy Manor that threatened to overtake her, and forced her expression to reflect his - predatory and coy.

Nott held her a moment longer, eyes searching hers, before he gave a little nod and finally released her, stepping back towards the hallway. "Well then. I guess we'll just have to see, won't we."

Hermione listened, still as a statue, to the sound of his feet on the stairs, and only when she heard the bedroom door close did she let out her breath in a gasp, her hands braced on the tabletop as she waited for her heart rate to return to normal.

* * *

 _ **A/N:** Taking advantage of an unusual amount of writing time this weekend, but we'll probably be back to weekly fairly soon. This for **Mags0607** \- the plot thickens, indeed._

 _If you've been following **Epistles** on tumblr, the series is now complete, and a master post is available on AO3 (linked from both **olivieblake dot tumblr dot com** , and **drsallysparrow dot tumblr dot com** )_


	6. Chapter 6

**_A/N_** _: Update schedule is all over the place but hope you enjoy!_

* * *

 **6: Rain**

* * *

Theo had hardly dared to believe that she was capable of such an oversight. He had half-expected the Vow to jump to life as his fingers closed around the handle. Had been waiting for it to yank nerve and muscle into submission and force him to set the thing back down.

It hadn't, and he had pressed the metal to her skin and had felt her go still.

 _How far will you go?_

He held a knife to her throat, desperate and scared and angry and _tell me tell me tell me._

 _That child behaves like an animal_ , his father spat.

The leap of her pulse where his knuckles grazed her skin as he pulled her upright. The buzz of her magic, the smell of her heady and clean, rain and roses.

 _Command me command me command me._

He'd wanted her to be afraid, wanted her to know he could hurt her, that his edges were as sharp as the blade in his hand. And then her voice had been so soft, so steady. _A partner_ , she'd said, _A partner, not a tool_. And he'd realised it was just another test.

 _How far will you go, Theodore?_

The memory of folding his arms, of biting his cheek to taste blood inside his mouth.

 _I won't do it._

His father's face, white with fury as he raised his wand. _No son of mine_ -

The wave of revulsion broke and it was all he could do not to push her away, but then she was stumbling and he was catching her and her hands, her hands were on his chest, her eyes were looking up at him, dark and questioning and _seeing him_.

Thoros Nott's son. How long had it been since somebody had looked at him and seen anything other than Thoros Nott's son?

A thin line of blood inched its way down her neck and he focussed on it, ignoring the way that tears threatened to close his throat. The sharp hitch of her breath when he pressed his finger to her skin, her chin tilting up towards him.

 _Command me_.

"It all comes back to blood in the end, doesn't it, Hermione?"

 _Hermione Hermione Hermione._

He tried to mock her, tried to twist the mellifluous syllables of the name into something poisonous, but as soon as it left his tongue he wanted to say it again.

There now - in her eyes - fear. Theo's stomach twisted and he stepped back towards the door as she schooled her face to coolness.

"We'll just have to see, won't we?" he said, turning so that she wouldn't see him close his shaking hand into a fist. He could still feel the weight of the knife in his fingers, could taste metal on his tongue.

He tried to swallow back the tightness in his throat as he climbed the stairs, but he found that he couldn't, and the sour taste of bile flooded his mouth. When Theo reached his bedroom it was all that he could do to close the door before he was stumbling across the floor, barely making it to the bathroom before he retched, choking up most of what he'd just eaten.

Resting his head against the cool porcelain of the toilet bowl, Theo drew in a few shuddering breaths, ignoring the tears that started in his eyes.

 _Too much food at once after so long_ , Theo told himself, as his mind replayed the flash of panic in Granger's eyes over and over again. He raised his hand, stared at the blood that still stained his fingertip, and tried to ignore the violent spasm of horror that ripped through him.

Theo wrenched himself upright, washing his hands and splashing water on his face, rinsing his mouth before he performed a tooth-cleaning charm. When he lifted his head it was to glare at his reflection in the mirror.

After the long months of imprisonment he could see the way that his father haunted the shadows that deepened the angles cut by his mother's cheekbones. Theo had Aria Nott's colouring, autumn browns and greens, but the biting cold of Thoros's gaze now sharpened his own.

 _A Nott must have a mind of winter._

Dark nights, the cruel grip of frost.

His mouth twisted, Aria's lips thinning into Thoros's fury, and he drew a shaky breath.

A whisper of roses and rain. The sudden promise of unfurling springtime.

Theo managed to control the tremor in his hands as he pulled off the muggle jumper and jeans, throwing them in a heap in the corner of the bedroom. His eyes caught on his discarded prison robes, the tattered remains of his Hogwarts uniform, and he gathered them up, dumping them on the narrow landing outside the door.

Granger had said she'd get rid of them, after all, he reasoned as he closed the door again.

 **OOOOO**

Hermione wasn't sure how long she sat at the kitchen table, her eyes resting, unseeing, on her hands. Long enough for her heart-rate to return to normal. Long enough to hear the water rattle into life somewhere above her as Nott readied himself for bed. Long enough to tell herself that she could no longer hear the echoes of Bellatrix's laughter.

Was it a mistake, getting him out? She had wondered for a moment, with the blade against her neck, whether he would do it. The scar on her arm had itched, the indelible memory of pain and fear etched in an ugly pucker kept hidden by her long sleeves.

And then the circle of his arm around her, catching her before she fell. Her heart galloping galloping galloping once more as she stared into his eyes, at his slightly open mouth.

She'd thought he might kiss her.

She'd thought she might let him.

Where had it come from, this need to fix broken things?

Where would it end?

Hermione sighed and grabbed a piece of toast from the remaining stack, but the first bite turned to ashes in her mouth and she ended up shredding it to pieces between her nervous fingers. "Stop it," she whispered, her voice loud in the empty kitchen. "Enough."

She rose from the chair, Vanishing the crumbs and then levitating the plates and bowls to the dishwasher. Ron still laughed at her for her faith in muggle cleaning, but Hermione found it hard to have as much faith in a _scourgify_ charm as she did in antibacterial detergents.

The thought of Ron had her thumbing the spot on her neck where the knife had broken the skin. He was training with the Aurors, gathering as much information as he could, and he'd promised to try and make sure that he was on duty for their first inspection.

 _"They forget, you know," he'd said with a wry half-smile._

 _Hermione had looked up at him from the book of case law that she'd been poring over in the tiny office, had felt her brow furrow with confusion. "Forget what?"_

 _"Between the Boy Who Lived, and The Brightest Witch of Her Age. They forget I was there too." There had been a gentle tease in Ron's voice, any resentment long-since smoothed away. He knew what he was to both of them, but she saw suddenly in the tightness of his jaw, the idle skip of his fingers along the crowded bookshelf, how hard it must be._

 _"We need you," she whispered, "We need to know what they're doing, what they're going to try, and you're the only one they don't suspect."_

 _"I know." Finally he looked her in the eye, "And I'll do everything I can."_

He could have said he loved her, then. Once, he would have, but instead they had only smiled sadly at one another.

Still, if Ron saw the mark on her neck Hermione wasn't sure what he'd do, and so she dimmed the lights in the kitchen and started upstairs, thinking of the Dittany in her bathroom cabinet.

She paused outside Nott's bedroom door, eyes narrowing at the robes dumped on the floor. In the lamplight she could see the worn remnants of green and silver embroidery at the openings of the sleeves, and realised with a pang of horror that they were his school robes.

 _Eight months_ , she thought, fury burrowing down to coil in her stomach. _Eight months and they didn't even give him a change of robes_. She brandished her wand, heard herself hiss _"Diffindo_ ," saw the tattered fabric rend itself into ribbons before finally she Vanished the sorry pile away and continued up the stairs to her own bedroom, her wand trailing red sparks in her wake.

 **OOOOO**

The bed was soft, and warm, and entirely too comforting, and after he'd heard Hermione's footsteps retreating upstairs Theo had pulled the duvet from it and laid himself on the bare floor, fitting the ache of his spine to the unforgiving wood.

He dreamed of dimly lit corridors, the shadow of something disappearing around the corner ahead of him no matter how fast he ran, always just slightly out of reach. He dreamed of dark liquid rising up, filling his nose and mouth with the taste of blood. He dreamed of that same blood dripping over his hands, and he dreamed of the flash of fear in Granger's eyes as he'd held her against him.

He dreamed of the feeling of her body against his, and he dreamed of the bird-like racing of her heart, and he dreamed of her fear, and he dreamed of her blood.

When he woke it was to rawness in his throat where he'd shouted, to the burn in his lungs where he'd sobbed, and to the feeling of cool hands on his forehead, smoothing his sweat-drenched hair back from his face.

"Shh," she whispered, "Shh, you're safe, it's over."

Theo grabbed blindly, unashamedly, arms snaking around her waist as he buried his face in her shoulder and breathed in the smell of her neck.

 _Safe._

She had stiffened momentarily when his arms had gone around her, but then her hand had come up to smooth down his bare spine, over and over, the way that you would calm a frightened animal. Her cheek moved against his as she hushed him, as she held the back of his neck and made nonsense sounds into his hair and whispered that everything would be fine.

He remembered, suddenly, another embrace. Being small enough for Narcissa Malfoy to gather him into her lap, Draco's eyes wide and frightened over her shoulder as Theo shook and sobbed. _Hush_ , she'd whispered, _I miss her too._

He gasped into Granger's shoulder, pushed her away and swiped at his face, feeling wretched with embarrassment.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I don't...I'm not…"

"It's alright," she said, hands dancing momentarily as though she were unsure what to do with them, and then settling on her knees. "You've slept a long time, and I was thinking about getting you up anyway, but then I heard you shout, and you must have fallen out of bed…" She gestured lamely at the floor, and Theo grimaced.

"I slept on the floor," he whispered, unable to meet her eyes.

"Oh…" It was barely a sound, but he heard the pity in it and glared at her. Granger had the grace to blush, at least, but then she was rising to her feet.

"Well, anyway. I have it on good authority that the Aurors will be dropping in for a surprise inspection in an hour or so, so you might as well get up and dressed before then if you don't want to have them pulling you out of bed."

Theo blinked at her sudden brusqueness, then decided he was grateful for it. "What time is it?" he asked, as he stood, pleased that he was only a little unsteady on his feet.

Granger's cheeks flamed as she looked at him, and Theo remembered he was only wearing boxers. Glancing down he was relieved to see that he had no other reason to be embarrassed, and so he lifted his eyes to hers and raised an eyebrow. "Time, Granger?"

She gave a little start, practically bolting across the room to the door. "It's nearly two," she called over her shoulder. "I'll have tea downstairs waiting for you when you're ready."

It didn't take him long to shower, and he pulled on the same clothes that he had worn the previous night before mooching slowly downstairs. As good as her word, Granger had a cup of strong, breakfast tea waiting for him. More toast sat on a plate, already buttered.

No knives in evidence, he noted.

Granger was sat at the table, her nose in a book written in what looked like Norman French, though without closer inspection he couldn't be sure. Theo slipped into the seat opposite her and raised the mug to his lips, sipping slowly at the tea and feeling the warmth of it dispelling the last, lingering chill of nightmare.

Without otherwise acknowledging him, Granger reached down beside her and produced another book, which she slid wordlessly across the table.

"Don't get butter on it," she murmured, before she flipped a page and made a scribbled note on the muggle legal pad that sat on the tabletop.

Theo hid his smile in a bite of toast, sucking the butter from his fingers before he drew the book towards him with one hand.

 _An Historiae of the Fundaments_ , was printed across the leather cover in bold copperplate. Intrigued, he lifted the cover delicately. There was a bookplate on the title page, proclaiming the book the property of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. Theo raised his eyes to look at Granger, but she was apparently engrossed in her own reading, and so he sighed, ate the last of his toast, and started to read.

Four chapters later there was a loud banging at the door and Theo jumped, knocking the half-drunk tea that Granger had refilled sometime before, and narrowly avoiding a bibliographic incident.

Granger was already out of her seat, her fingers trailing absently across his shoulders as she stepped behind him and into the hallway. Theo swallowed as he heard her unlocking the door, as he heard a gruff voice demand entry.

"I've nothing to hide," Granger was saying as she came back into the kitchen. Theo's shoulders tensed as three men entered behind her, two in the deep purple robes of full Aurors, and one in the red of a trainee. Turning towards them and raising his eyes, Theo was shocked to see that it was Weasley in the red robes, eyeing him with an unreadable expression in his eyes.

"Well then, Nott, would you look at you," said a gruff voice, and Theo bit his tongue at Davies' sneering tone. His eyes flicked briefly to the third man, who was looking at him as though Theo was something unmentionable that had just been scraped off his shoe, before returning to Davies, who was obviously in charge.

"Having a lovely time, are we?" Davies asked, his arm thrusting forward so that his wand pressed into the soft underside of Theo's jaw.

"Hey!" Hermione said, starting to step forward, but Weasley threw an arm out to stop her.

"You're lucky, Nott," Davies growled, "Lucky that Granger here decided you have some value." His eyes narrowed, his voice dropping to a murmur. "I'd have thrown you in Azkaban myself, Mark or no, but I guess we all have our different ideas of what constitutes a fitting punishment for being a fucking Death Eater."

 _I wasn't_ , Theo wanted to shout _, They couldn't make me_. He settled for glowering back up at the man, hoping Davies could see the hatred in his eyes.

They stayed that way for a moment, and then Davies put his wand up. "Defiant little shit, isn't he." He wiped his wand against his robes before pocketing it, as though the mere touch of Theo's skin had somehow contaminated it.

"Mark it up, Hickory," Davies said, his tone turning bored, "Poor attitude."

"That is ridiculous!" Granger's voice was sharp with anger, her hair sparking and eyes dancing with it.

"Hermione," Weasley said in a low voice, "Just don't."

She opened her mouth to reply but then her gaze fell on something in the doorway and she closed it with a snap. Theo looked towards whatever had caught her attention and squinted slightly, trying to focus on -

A fourth wizard stood just outside the kitchen, his cloak pulled up so that his face was hidden in shadow.

Something about him made Theo's eyes want to slide away, edges blurred by what he realised must be a powerful Notice-Me-Not charm. If Granger hadn't looked right at him…

As though she had realised her mistake the witch came and stood by his chair, seeming to deliberately draw the attention of the Aurors as she placed a gentle hand on his shoulder.

Davies' nose wrinkled with disgust. "If you've no further infractions to make, we'll leave you and your _mistress_ in peace," he said, a twist of his mouth making his meaning clear.

Granger's fingers clenched slightly on Theo's shoulder, but she didn't say anything, and after eyeballing her a moment longer Davies turned and marched out of the room, followed by Hickory. Neither of them spared a glance for the wizard in the hallway, though Theo saw Weasley's eyes drift to him before he nodded to Granger. "Good luck," the ginger-haired wizard murmured, before he followed his colleagues out of the house.

"Bloody hell," Granger whispered. Her hand was still resting on her shoulder, and Theo wondered for a moment if she'd forgotten, before her fingers squeezed gently. "That probably went as well as it could have done," she sighed, before pursing her lips and looking back through the doorway. "Are you going to come in or not?" she huffed impatiently.

Theo heard a low chuckle from under the hood as the man stepped into the kitchen and felt his blood run cold.

The wizard raised one gloved hand and pulled his hood back to reveal the smirking face and shining, silvery hair of Draco Malfoy.

"Theo," he drawled, "Good to see you not behind bars."

* * *

 ** _A/N:_** _I'm evil._


	7. Chapter 7

**Warning** : Very strong language.

* * *

 **7: Speak**

* * *

Hermione felt Nott tense under her hand, heard his sharp little intake of breath before he exhaled, making a choking sound of disbelief. She saw Malfoy's smirk drop, watched the concern flash in his grey eyes.

It was an interesting look for him, she decided.

"Theo?" Malfoy's voice was quiet, held the slightest waver of uncertainty.

"You _utter cunt_ , Draco." The words were a harsh gasp, sounding like they'd been torn from him - as though the very effort of speaking might have ripped a wound beneath Nott's ribs. He surged up from the chair, wrenching away from Hermione's touch and curling his fingers into his palm as he threw himself across the small space and smashed his fist into Malfoy's cheek.

" _Fuck_!" the blond wizard yelped, one hand coming up to cradle his cheekbone. Nott swayed on his feet, off-balance and seeming half-dizzied by the sudden movement, and Malfoy's other arm caught hold of Nott as the dark-haired wizard collapsed against him, pressing his face into Malfoy's neck and choking out sobs.

"I'm sorry," Malfoy was whispering, "Shit, Theo, I'm so sorry I didn't - "

"You left me alone," Nott gasped, and Hermione's hand came up to her mouth, hearing the wretchedness of it. "You left me _alone,_ Draco, and I thought you were dead, they told me you were _dead_ and I was alone and - "

"I know," Malfoy's other hand had buried itself in Nott's hair, and though the blond wizard was shorter by a couple of inches he was clearly holding both of them up. His eyes caught Hermione's over Nott's shoulder, and she was shocked by the anguish in them.

"I know," Malfoy went on, "and I'm sorry. I wanted to tell you, I wanted to get a message to you but we couldn't risk it and -"

Nott pushed against Malfoy's chest, his head recoiling sharply, and though Hermione couldn't see his face she saw the other man cringe at his expression.

"Who, the _fuck_ , is _we_?" Nott demanded, his tone suddenly low and venomous and seething with rage.

Malfoy's face went blank, gaze skittering to Hermione's again before he looked Nott in the eye.

"Me," he said slowly, "Granger, Harry bloody Potter." He ignored Hermione's soft sound of disapproval. "My mother, Aunt Andromeda, most of the Weasleys," he took a breath, "Daphne and Pansy when they can, although they're both under Ministry supervision -"

"Oh right, of course," Nott made a gagging noise that Hermione realised was supposed to be a derisive laugh, "Just a _happy_ _few_ then."

Malfoy's hand came up to cup Nott's cheek, avoiding the dark-haired wizard's attempt to flinch away. The gesture was tender and surprisingly intimate, and Hermione found herself thrown by the fierce look in Malfoy's eyes.

"You and me, Theo," he breathed, "Band of brothers, always." He swallowed, seeming to choose his words carefully, "But I've got to be dead."

Nott's breath hitched and Malfoy pressed his forehead to his friend's, eyes closed and brows lowered.

"I've got to be dead," he whispered, "because they would never have released me." He grimaced, "Marked, and a Malfoy. There was no way. But you," he grasped Nott's shoulders, holding the other man away from himself to stare into his eyes again, "Granger, Aunt Andromeda, Percy fucking Weasley, they got you _released_ , Theo. You're _free_."

Nott's shoulders stayed tensed for a long moment, and then he nodded - a tiny, jerking movement - letting Malfoy's tighten his arms around him once more before he finally, gently extricated himself, swiping at his eyes.

Upon stepping back Nott gave a shaky laugh that at least sounded somewhat real, clasping Malfoy's shoulder and nodding again before he half-turned to Hermione.

"Still got the bloody Vow to think about," he said, glassy eyes lifting to meet hers.

"We'll get it undone as soon as we can," Hermione said firmly, ignoring the face that Malfoy made. "The Aurors will check it the first couple of months, but we're hoping that they'll back off after that."

There was a pause while Nott looked at her, and she felt Malfoy's stare as well.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Nott said finally, the tiny break in his voice striking right to her very core.

Hermione bit her lip, forced herself to keep looking him in the eye. "Can you honestly say that you would have believed me?" she asked quietly, hoping he would see the truth of it.

Nott's mouth pursed sceptically, "Narcissa," he said slowly, "Narcissa could have -"

"Mother is under house arrest with Aunt Andromeda," Malfoy cut in softly, "She was not allowed to attend your hearing, nor is she allowed to visit you."

"We're lucky they didn't put a Trace on you," Hermione said, "Because it's going to be complicated enough as it is setting up an alarm here and making sure the DMT don't notice there's an illegal Floo connection to Grimmauld Place."

"Grimmauld Place?" Nott asked, brow furrowed as he tried to place the familiar-sounding name. "What - where - ?"

"One of the old Black properties," Malfoy said, "Great-Aunt Walburga must have forgotten about the entail, because it passed to Cousin Sirius after she died, and then he left it to Potter -"

"Why in Merlin's name would Sirius Black leave his house to Potter?" Nott asked, his frown deepening as he glanced between the pair of them.

Hermione sighed, gesturing towards the table as Malfoy's mouth made a little 'o' of surprise.

"There's quite a lot that you still don't know," she said. "But you're still half dead on your feet, so will you at least sit down?" She frowned, noting Nott's wan colouring. "You could probably do with having something else to eat, as well."

"You know, Granger, I could do with having something done about my _face_ ," Malfoy said, touching his fingers delicately to the burgeoning bruise beneath his right eye. "I wouldn't want any damage to be permanent."

"I think it rather suits you," Hermione sniffed, "Brings out your general aura of dickishness."

He huffed something that sounded dangerously close to "Bloody witch," and Hermione narrowed her eyes at him.

Malfoy sighed dramatically before pulling out the chair next to Nott's and sliding into it with insouciant casualness. "Have you got anything to drink at least, Granger?" he smirked.

The urge to hex him was powerful, but Hermione managed to force a tight smile to her face. "Only muggle stuff I'm afraid."

Both wizards snickered at her tone, and she felt the knot of anxiety start to untwist itself in her stomach. "I'm sure he'll be fine with that," Nott murmured, his mouth pulling into a wry smile, "Slumming it, and all."

Hermione opened her mouth to respond sharply, but caught the gleam in Nott's eyes as his smile widened at her, and settled for shooting him a _look_ instead.

With a casual wave of her wand she summoned tumblers to the table, and another flick had Nott's filled with water as she turned to plonk a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc in front of Malfoy.

"You can _slum it_ with tap water, Nott," she said crisply, before she opened the fridge and started rummaging around for ingredients for a basic pasta sauce.

Malfoy chuckled, but it was Nott's low laughter that made a shiver run down Hermione's spine.

 **OOOOO**

Two hours later, with a stomach uncomfortably full even after Granger had only allowed him a half-portion of pasta, Theo sat back in his chair to start chewing over the various revelations that had been made to him.

 _The Department of Mysteries_. _Blood Magic_. _Horcruxes_. _Prophecy_.

 _Draco_.

 _Hermione_.

 _Granger_ , Theo reminded himself sharply. Muggleborn Granger with her outrageous hair and her clever eyes and her infuriatingly excellent cooking. As though she could hear his thoughts the witch caught his eye across the table and gave him a small smile as Draco rounded off his story.

"...and Granger apparently knows how to _Gemino_ liquid now so they splattered the entire cell with blood before they triggered the wards and Potter took me out under his invisibility cloak."

"Because of course Potter has an invisibility cloak," Theo murmured into his empty bowl.

"Well of course," said a voice from behind him, making him jump and clatter his cutlery.

Granger's hand covered his own on the table, the warm weight of it mortifyingly reassuring. "Harry," she admonished, "For Godric's sake."

"Sorry," Potter said, stepping around the table to sit beside Granger, dropping an affectionate kiss on her hair before he slumped into the chair and starting picking at her leftover food. "Nott," he offered Theo a weary smile, before turning to nod coolly at the other wizard. " _Malfoy_." Theo saw Potter's eyes flash with teasing humour behind his ridiculous spectacles.

"Potter," Draco drawled in response. He sounded faintly amused, and Theo felt the slightest flutter of jealousy. Something must have shown in his face because Granger's fingers squeezed his hand gently, and he raised his eyes to meet hers.

Granger's gaze was steady, warm and unflinching. She saw him, and she did not look away, and Theo felt his hurt, his fearful, frightful anger, starting to melt before he withdrew his hand.

Granger frowned slightly at him, but then Potter was talking and it didn't matter anyway.

"Well Nott, your file has officially been marked as a non-flight risk," the green-eyed wizard said, "And though Davies is still itching to haul you off to Azkaban, he's not going to do anything about it for now, from the looks of things."

"Davies is an arse," Draco remarked, though from his tone Theo guessed that his feelings on the matter were a little stronger than his words.

"He's dangerous," said Granger. "Yaxley was in charge of the Department when he started his training." Theo remembered the sallow, dirty-blond wizard who had been good friends with, and just as sadistic as, his father. "After what happened to his family Davies has every right to hate Death Eaters, but he's as bloodthirsty as any of them, and twice as clever as most."

"What happened to his family?" Theo asked quietly.

Wincing, Granger opened her mouth, but it was Draco who spoke. "His mother and sister were tortured to death." The flatness of his friend's voice told Theo enough to know that it was highly likely one or both of their fathers had been involved.

"Right. Well I guess we can add that to my list of things to feel guilty about."

"Guilty?" said Potter. "What are you _actually_ guilty of?"

There was an edge to his words that Theo couldn't identify, and he felt the helpless anger rise up in his chest. "I don't know," he spat, "Being my father's son? Being sorted into Slytherin?" Granger made a quiet hum of protest and he glared at her. "There must be something. Otherwise they wouldn't - they couldn't -" Theo sighed as he felt the fight go out of himself. "The good guys won, right? Your side won?" He glanced between Potter and Granger, who were both watching him with guarded expressions, "They wouldn't lock up innocent people without trial."

Potter made a choking sound that Theo thought might have been a laugh, though it had nothing to do with humour. "That is so _unbelievably_ fucking naive," the black-haired wizard said, his glasses flashing as he pushed himself up from the table and strode out of the room.

As they heard the front door slam Theo looked at Granger in utter confusion, and she gave him a thin smile. "Sirius," she said quietly. "Twelve years in Azkaban without trial. And it was the good guys that put him there."

Draco sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. "Well, good. Great." He stood slowly from the table, stretching his arms towards the ceiling. "I'll make sure he's alright," he yawned, "Although I might just call Weaselette, because she'll probably make more headway."

He placed a hand on Theo's shoulder, "I'm sorry to leave you alone with only Granger for company, Theo, but she does have a decent book collection." Draco ignored the witch's cough of indignation as he went on, "I've got a long day of skulking around the Ministry again tomorrow." He looked over at Granger, now sitting with her arms crossed and a narrow expression on her face, "Thank you for dinner, Granger. And - thank you."

Theo watched, fascinated, as Granger's eyes warmed just a touch, though her expression remained unamused. "You're welcome, Malfoy. Now go away."

Draco laughed quietly as he squeezed Theo's shoulder before leaving the room, closing the front door behind him much more gently than Potter had.

"God," Granger said, bringing both hands to her face. "I'm sorry, but I honestly..." she peeped between her fingers at him, "Would you have believed me?"

"Probably not," Theo conceded. Granger folded her hands in front of her mouth and considered him over the top of them. He wanted to reach out and grab those hands and he wanted to scream at her for looking at him that way and he wanted to be gathered in her arms again and told that he was _safe he was safe he was safe_.

"What now?" he asked, instead.

Granger smoothed her hands over her hair, clasping them behind her neck. "I'd like to go to Nott Manor, when you're ready. Check out the library there, see if there's anything useful."

Theo nodded, "That makes sense."

"Are you alright to stay here a few more days?" she asked, "Only I think it will be easier for you to recover your strength away from all the comings and goings at Grimmauld."

With a weary sigh, Theo nodded again. "Probably a good idea. Although," he heard the vulnerability in his voice and hated himself for it. "Can I speak to Nar - to Lady Malfoy, do you think?"

Her bright, brown eyes. Clever eyes, seeing straight into the heart of him. "Of course," she whispered softly, her hand finally reaching out so that he could seize her fingers with an eagerness and relief that made his heart stutter.

 _A mind of winter, Theodore_.

What did it matter, anyway?

* * *

 _ **A/N:** Sorry for making you wait for this, hope it was worth it!_


	8. Chapter 8

_**A/N** : Late, as ever. My apologies. Just a general warning from here on out there will be regular references to abuse, both of a child and spousal._

* * *

 **8: Reach**

* * *

Blood on the walls, blood on the floor, his father's voice, his mother - his mother - his mother -

 _You have her eyes_.

Burning, burning, in his veins and in his muscles and always - always - _I won't_ , Theo spat, _I won't_.

 _You will, boy_.

Blood and fear and darkness and the screaming - he thought he had forgotten the screaming but now -

Now _he_ was screaming, screaming and clawing himself awake, months of nightmares that he had simply not _allowed_ himself to have while locked away beneath the Ministry now seeming to take more delight in his freedom than he did.

"Theo!" He turned towards her voice, wrapping his own fingers around the hand that shook his shoulder, gasping as his eyes opened to light and morning and Granger's face. He shuddered, scrunching them shut again, forcing himself not to whimper as she ran her fingers gently over his cheek.

"How bad was it?" Granger asked softly when he opened his eyes again. Her hand was still on his cheek and Theo pushed himself upright and drew deliberately away from her.

 _This has to stop._

She flinched, her hand withdrawing quickly as though scalded, and Theo grimaced at the hurt in her eyes. "Which part of it?"

For a moment Granger simply looked at him, the faint suggestion of a frown in the line of her brows, "Whatever it is that you're dreaming about, I guess."

Theo sighed, drawing his knees up under the duvet and staring down at the exposed wood of the floor. For a moment he saw another floor, a growing pool of blood, his mother's blank, staring eyes and his father's quiet fury. So much _worse_ , that quiet, than when he roared with rage.

"Bad," he murmured, "It was bad."

"Narcissa said -"

"What," Theo heard the sudden bite in his own voice, saw Granger bridle at his tone, "did Narcissa say?"

She bit her cheek, but he saw resolve harden in her eyes. "That things were bad for you long before Voldemort came back." Granger swallowed, then pressed on. "She said that your father - that she didn't realise until Lucius hugged Draco one day and you just _stared_."

Theo gave another of his low, humourless laughs. "Yes, well. I'm glad that the two of you have found so much to talk about."

"Please don't be like that." A twitch at the edges of the Vow. Request, not command. She was being careful, being so careful, and Theo found that it was that more than anything that frustrated him.

"Then tell me what to be, _Hermione_ ," he said, mocking her with her name. Oh, Draco had always been the bully, ready with an insult or a jibe, but Theo knew how to _twist_.

Granger flushed, rising to her feet. "No."

Theo shot her a shit-eating grin and her eyes narrowed. "You can take it up with her yourself, anyway," she said quietly. "Andromeda replied to my note, so we'll be going over to Grimmauld Place as soon as you're up."

The smile fell from his face and he stared at her, watching the upward tick of her mouth deepen with something like smugness. His fingers tingled with the desire to trace the shape of it. _Damn her_ , Theo thought, as Granger turned and left the room.

 **OOOOO**

He'd dressed himself in the same jeans as the day before but a different jumper, this one a dark, Slytherin green that she remembered her dad wearing when she was small.

It was confusing somehow, seeing him in it, remembering the feel of the wool against her cheek when she was pulled into an embrace. _Fat chance,_ Hermione thought, sounding uncomfortably Weasley-esque even to herself.

She huffed a sigh through her nose as she turned to the small fireplace in the sitting room. " _Incendio_ ," she murmured, and flames leapt from her wand to dance prettily against the dark metal. She grabbed a handful of Floo powder from the pot on the mantlepiece and threw it into the flames, which immediately flared green.

"Nott," she said, "You go -" she paused, considered the wording. "Probably best if you go first."

He gave her one of his sideways looks, his eyes flashing almost turquoise as they caught the morning sunlight. "As you will. Where am I going?"

She clenched her fingers around her wand in frustration. _Stop it. Stop this._

"Number 12, Grimmauld Place," she paused, "The headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix."

Nott gave her a sharp look at that, his mouth opening slightly as though to ask a question but then he shook his head, stepping forward into the flames. "Number 12, Grimmauld Place," he called, and with a whooshing sound he was gone.

Hermione threw another handful of Floo powder into the fire then followed him through.

When the push-pull of the Floo travel stopped and she was spat out into Grimmauld Place she found the drawing room quiet and unoccupied except for the tall wizard who stood just in front of the fireplace, so that Hermione nearly ran into him as she exited.

Nott caught and steadied her, their bodies brushing against one another, and Hermione felt her cheeks heat as he stared down at her. "You've got -" he murmured, rubbing his thumb over her nose, and her breath caught and his eyes widened and he dropped his hands and stepped back from her.

"Right," she said. "Right, ok then."

He had been looking at his hands, held slightly in front of him, as though they belonged to somebody else entirely. At her words he glared at her, opening his mouth no doubt to hurl some sort of invective, but they were interrupted by the door opening.

 **OOOOO**

He could feel the ghost of her skin on his fingertips, the feel of her, so easy to slide his thumb over that upturned little nose, and then she was talking and he - he - how _dare_ she -

 _A mind of winter, a mind of winter, a mind of winter_.

And the door was open, a soft cry, a flurry of robes and blonde hair and then there were arms around him, a soft brush of lips over his cheek. "Oh _Theodore_." The scent of gardenias filled his nose, the memory of comfort, and Theo heard himself give a little sob as he hugged Narcissa back. So small, had she always been so small?

Eventually she pulled back, her wide blue eyes scanning his face, cataloguing him, her mouth twisting with obvious dislike of what she saw. This was the Narcissa that few people knew, the Narcissa who had held him in the terrible nights after his mother had died, when he had cried wordlessly. This wasn't the imperious woman who had stood by Lucius Malfoy's side, who had watched the Dark Lord murder and maim without betraying a twitch.

Theo had learned a great deal from Narcissa Malfoy.

"He that outlives this day, and comes safe home," he murmured, remembering being tucked into the small cot bed in Draco's room, her reading it to them. She smiled, her eyes glittering with - but Narcissa did not cry, Theo thought - and her hand cupped his cheek.

"But all's not done," she whispered, and he saw something flash in her eyes as her hand dropped from his face. _Fear_.

He looked for Granger, found her standing across the room next to a tall witch who looked just like - just like -

"No!" Theo yelped, pushing himself away from Narcissa, scrambling backwards as his pulse roared and he grabbed for his wand and as he did he saw a spasm of pain cross the witch's face, enough to dissolve the resemblance to Bellatrix. The planes of her face were softer, the colour of her eyes lighter and her hair almost auburn rather than that rat's nest of black twists that had crowned the mad witch.

Granger started forward, face alight with concern, but Narcissa had reached a slow hand out towards him. "My sister," she said, holding his gaze steadily, "Andromeda." When Theo didn't shy away, she laid her fingers on his half-raised wand arm, pushing it gently down.

He nodded, his mouth dry and bitter with the aftertaste of fear. "I apologise for - for -" he swept a shaking hand across himself, and Narcissa made a quiet clucking noise with her tongue.

"Don't be ridiculous." She stepped back, smoothing her robes as she did. The faintest whisper of magic done wordlessly, wandlessly, and without looking. Easy to forget, sometimes, how very powerful she was, Theo thought.

He looked to the other witch, to Andromeda, again. She gave him a small smile, the expression softening the proud lines of her face that marked her as a Black, as Bellatrix and Narcissa's sister, and Theo remembered.

" _They lost their balance without you, Andy. They didn't know how to be just the two of them." He was playing wizard chess against himself, the set that his father had got him for Christmas. His mother's voice was very quiet, and Theo only half-listened to the chink of cups and saucers, the murmured conversation._

" _Tell Cissy I miss her, won't you."_

"I remember you," he said flatly, "You were friends with my mother."

At his words her face paled ever so slightly, and she inhaled sharply. Narcissa glanced over her shoulder at her sister, her own face hidden from him. "Theodore," Andromeda said faintly, grey eyes not leaving his. "I think that you should come downstairs and have some breakfast, and then we can talk."

He nodded and Andromeda turned from the room, Narcissa following behind her. Granger waited, watching him, and Theo gave himself a little shake as he started after the two older witches. When he reached her side Granger shifted subtly, starting to move out of his way, but Theo was too exhausted to fight himself and so he caught hold of her arm, so small, so thin, fingers wrapping around it easily, bones fine and breakable.

 _Do it_ , said his father's voice. _Do it._

 _I won't_.

He closed his eyes rather than meet her gaze. "Just - please," he whispered, and she said nothing, knowing that it had to be her, that he could not, and she slid her arm through his gentle grip so that she could wrap it around his back, so that she could smooth her fingers around the curve of his shoulderblade.

Knowing without asking. Such a tiny movement, the barest shift in gravity. Strings pulling at him as he leaned his head down and rested his cheek against her hair.

* * *

 _ **A/N:** This should receive another update this week but will then be back to weekly, probably Wednesdays, unless I can manage more, which I will certainly try to! _

_Theo and Narcissa quote **Henry V** to one another, much as Draco and Theo did last chapter (and I forgot to flag it). _

_If you'd like some relief from angst then **olivieblake** and I have commenced a follow-up letter series, entitled **The Letters of Lord Voldemort.** You can find it over on tumblr if creative swearing (Voldemort), depraved toe fetishes (Bella) and biting sarcasm (Lucius) are your thing._


	9. Chapter 9

_**A/N:** Hello lovely people, and welcome back._

* * *

 **9: Spice**

* * *

Granger's lips brushed his collarbone when she whispered "OK?" and Theo felt gooseflesh radiate outwards across his skin from the contact. He stiffened and nodded, not trusting himself to speak, and she dropped the hand that had come to rest gently on his hip, though the other remained on his back as she turned to the door.

He reached behind himself, lifting her fingers away. He couldn't, he _wouldn't_ let her have this too, no matter what he asked for in a moment of weakness. He was tired of being afraid, and yet Granger…

It scared him, the way the air moved around her, the way he could feel himself angled towards her at any given moment.

Barely two days since his release, and he was a wreck. Not since he was nine years old, reaching out from the nightmare to find himself wrapped in arms that were not his mother's, to find that _the nightmare_ _was real_ , had he allowed himself to admit weakness and yet here he was. Draco and Narcissa were one thing, they were - they were the closest thing to family that he had, but fucking _Granger_ -

He was letting her in, letting her behind the walls that he had so carefully built around himself.

Was it the Vow, Theo wondered, that led her through the gaps in his defences? _No_ , he thought, as her eyes lifted to his, her smile tentative. He kept his own mouth a firm line.

 _No_.

His eyes traced the shape of her face, reluctantly fascinated by the way the light fell on it. The word, the feeling, sat at the tip of his tongue, daring him to open himself up, to admit his vulnerability. _Beaut-_

But Theo had learned coldness, had built his walls long ago, and he denied the racing of his heart. _A mind of winter._

Granger's smile fell when he didn't return it but she said nothing, turning to walk silently through the door, motioning with her hand for him to follow, which he did.

They ended up in a narrow hallway, clearly recently redecorated. A heavy damask curtain was pulled incongruously across one wall, which Theo assumed to be internal given the apparent layout of the house. "What -" he started, but Granger hushed him quickly.

"Walburga Black," she murmured. "The portrait's fixed with a permanent-sticking charm, and she screams bloody murder whenever you wake her."

Theo eyed the curtain uncertainly as they snuck past it and down another narrow set of stairs that led into the basement kitchen at the back of the house.

The contrast between the kitchen and the hallway could not have been more pronounced. Sunlight streamed through the large windows along one side of the room, white-gold and almost springlike. A fire roared in the huge hearth but the room was dominated by a large wooden table, at which Narcissa and Andromeda were already seated.

It was a much more comfortable setting, somehow, than Theo had been expecting, and he blinked as his image of Narcissa adjusted to allow her to fit into it. Hermione slid onto the bench opposite the Black sisters, and Theo sat down next to her. Narcissa watched them, and Theo saw her note the careful distance that they maintained, though she said nothing.

Andromeda slid a bowl towards each of them and Theo caught the scent of cinnamon and nutmeg. He looked down at the porridge in the bowl, then back up at the older witch, for once hardly caring for the way that he knew, that he could feel, the play of shock and grief across his features.

"How did you…" he asked, voice trailing away as she gave him a sad smile. Granger looked curiously between the pair of them, and then frowned down into her own bowl.

"Aria Nott was one of my best friends," Andromeda said gently. "One of the very few of my friends who continued to acknowledge me after my marriage."

At this Narcissa made a tiny movement, and Andromeda's hand lifted to cover hers without looking away from Theo.

"I remember," Andromeda said simply, her eyes not leaving Theo's.

His mother had always insisted the house elves serve him porridge with cinnamon and nutmeg grated over it. After her death, his father had banned the spices from the house.

 _Traitorous bitch_ , he'd spat _. Bringing you up soft. You are a Nott._

Theo nodded dumbly, grasping his spoon and taking a mouthful, closing his eyes so as to deny the tears that threatened when the familiar taste slipped over his tongue. He swallowed, took a deep breath, and looked back at Andromeda.

"Tell me," he said simply.

She studied him a moment longer, then gave a little nod. It was Narcissa who spoke first though. "Aria Fawley," she said, "attended Hogwarts at the same time as me, Andromeda and -"

"You look so very like her," Andromeda interjected, before her sister could say the other name. She frowned slightly, looking between him and Granger and then back to Narcissa, who was also studying the pair of them.

They seemed to share a moment of wordless communication and then Andromeda picked up the story. "She was in my year, in Ravenclaw, but our families were friends and so that continued while we were at school." She bit her lip. "When we were sixteen your father sued for my hand."

Theo felt Granger shift to attention beside him, her spoon resting in her half-finished bowl of porridge, clearly forgotten. "You didn't tell me that," she said, a note of protest in her voice. Theo cleared his throat, frowning at her, and she offered him a chastened look. "Sorry," she whispered.

 _Admitting a fault_ , Theo thought. _What a power._ _What a wondrous thing to be able to do_.

Andromeda had smiled slightly but her expression was guarded. "No," she said, "No I didn't. I wasn't - ah -" she looked at Narcissa again.

"We are telling you now," the blonde witch said curtly, face expressionless.

Granger made a little _hmph_ ing sound, looking expectantly at Andromeda, but Theo was watching Narcissa. Oh she was impassive, without a doubt, had faced down the Dark Lord, certainly; but everyone had their tells when you knew where to look for them, and - _there_ : the barest clenching of her jaw, and he knew that there was something they weren't saying.

"Anyway," Andromeda sighed, smoothing the moment with practiced finesse. "He made me an offer, and my parents accepted him, but I was rather strongly opposed to the idea." She smiled softly, sadly, and Theo knew what was coming next. "When I eloped with Ted they were, naturally, furious. And with both - both my sisters promised to others, Thoros took his suit elsewhere."

Narcissa looked at Granger again, tipping her head slightly. "Aria Fawley was a natural choice," she said. "Sacred 28, beautiful, clever -"

"Dutiful," Andromeda said, "For the most part."

"Indeed," Narcissa nodded, "So they were married as soon as she graduated, although as with most Pureblood marriages it took them a long time to conceive a child."

"I know all this," Theo said, aware that his impatience made him sound like his father, seeing it in the look that Andromeda gave him, suddenly calculating, Black to the roots of her hair.

"Yes, well," she said, "I said that she was dutiful. But it turned out that she and Thoros, that there were things that she felt went beyond the duties of a wife, of a mother..."

Her voice trailed away, and Theo felt his stomach tighten. He knew what was coming. Had always known it, though he hadn't ever been told; why would they need to tell him, when it was so very obvious?

He remembered her hands shaking, remembered her wrapping him in his cloak.

He remembered his father's voice, low and furious - _you think - you dare -_

Thoros's fingers around his arm, wrenching him away.

The pain of the dislocated shoulder. It had been Lucius who had fixed it, Lucius who had picked Theo up from where he had slumped against the wall, who had turned to Thoros and said in a low hiss, _what have you done?_

Theo's mother had screamed, once. He remembered the sound of it now, for it had played itself over and over to him in the days afterwards, until he had simply decided that it had to _stop_.

He remembered the slash of his father's wand and the soft, wet thud of Aria's body hitting the floor.

The spray of blood on the wallpaper. The pool of it spreading across the floor, lapping at the foot of the travelling trunk.

He had been looking at his mother, but her eyes had not seen him.

He glared at the two witches sat opposite him, daring one of them to say it aloud, this thing that he had known since he was nine years old. The thing that he had built the foundations of himself upon.

 _A Nott must have a mind of winter._

"She was going to leave him," Narcissa whispered, "So he killed her."

 **OOOOO**

Hermione watched Nott's fingers tighten around his spoon, saw the blood drain from his face. _He doesn't look surprised_ , she thought stupidly, _He doesn't -_

"You knew," she said, staring at him. He turned his eyes to her, glittering shards of colour, bright and cold now as they had ever been. She remembered the Thestrals in their fifth year, realised the truth of it with a thrill of horror. "You were there," she whispered.

Nott's eyes flashed and his mouth twisted. She wanted to reach for him but knew instinctively that he would not welcome it.

So many wounds torn into him, everything held in such a fine balance. She had seen the loathing flash in his gaze, felt him shudder under her touch, and Hermione began to understand why he would push her away every time she came close.

One thing for Draco Malfoy to learn a language of hatred by rote. Quite another for Theodore Nott to have it physically branded upon his person, even if it was nothing as visible as the Mark. She had felt the way he looked at her, felt the tremble in his hands when they touched hers.

"I told you it was bad," he said quietly, giving her a little nod before he looked back to Andromeda and Narcissa.

"Why does it matter now?" he asked. "She's been dead ten years."

The sisters gave one another one of the long looks that Hermione had had to accustom herself to over the past few months. She'd found it oddly fascinating, having grown up an only child, to watch them slip back into patterns obviously established decades ago and still not forgotten despite an estrangement of over twenty years.

"It matters," Narcissa said slowly, "Because your father became rather...obsessed, after her death."

They were coming to the part of the story that Hermione knew, and she felt its disparate elements shifting into place, the overall picture acquiring a wholeness that hadn't been there before.

"Voldemort was determined to conquer death," Andromeda explained. "He wanted the Hallows, to possess the physical items that would make him Master of Death, or so the old tales said."

"Your father had another idea," Narcissa said, her voice low and suddenly urgent, eyes intent upon Nott's. "He said there was a room, buried far beneath the Ministry, where the dead could be heard to whisper."

"The Department of Mysteries," Hermione supplied. "They went there in our fifth year, to get the prophecy -"

"How could I forget?" Nott growled, and Hermione bit her lip.

Andromeda shot her a quelling look before she spoke. "Hermione, I think, has already told you that the Department was sealed, that whatever it was that Voldemort was after in there, the Unspeakables wanted to protect it badly enough to sacrifice themselves."

"You think it was something that my father found." He shook his head, mouth forming a smile of - _not disbelief_ , Hermione realised _, incredulity_.

"That fucker," he said, as though to confirm her thoughts.

Narcissa frowned at him, and Nott offered her a smile that was equal parts insolence and contrition. "I made a copy of some of his notes," she said once they had stared at one another for a few moments, and Hermione remembered the paper that Narcissa had stuffed into her hand before the Aurors had dragged her away after the Battle.

She had been so afraid, so desperate.

"And?" Nott asked, all polite enquiry; all irony.

"And," Hermione said softly, picking up the last threads of the story, "It isn't enough. But we think there's probably more at Nott Manor."

"So you need me." Nott sat back, folding his arms. "What was it, Granger?" He tossed her a mocking smile, "A skeleton key, not a battering ram?"

Hermione could feel the blush working its way up her neck, spreading across her cheeks. Small comfort that she saw his eyes turn hungry as he watched her. "We need your mind, first and foremost," she said, sounding defensive even to her own ears. "And then, yes, we need your access."

* * *

 _ **A/N:** Endless love and thanks to my soulmate **olivieblake** who coaxed me through this with such gentle grace that I am left flabbergasted by her patience._

 _The reactions to **Nyctophilia** continue to thrill me. Thank you for your reviews, your kindness and your encouragement; it means so very, very much._


	10. Chapter 10

_**A/N:** Hello! From next week Nycto will be updating on Wednesdays (or as close to as things allow)._

* * *

 **10: Twitch**

* * *

Theo let the silence hang in the air, watching Granger fidget under his scrutiny. He was comfortable with silence; knew that there was a trick to not speaking. It was one of the key differences between him and Draco, that Theo had the patience to wait for someone else to crack. It was how he had found out about the Vanishing Cabinet in their sixth year; _fuck_ it was how he'd found out that Draco had taken the Mark in the first place.

They'd fought terribly over that, he remembered, the way that only good friends can fight - throwing words at one another that were calculated to hurt.

" _What in Merlin's name were you thinking, Draco? Is Lucius's approval really worth throwing your fucking life away?"_

" _At least I still have half a chance of winning my father's approval, unlike some people."_

 _He went utterly still at the words; saw Draco go even paler than usual as he realised what he'd said. Theo forced himself to smile ruefully, swallowing the sting of it._

" _You're right, of course. But at least it means I'm not consigning myself to the service of a madman."_

He looked up at Narcissa and Andromeda again, who had said nothing since Granger's admission that they needed him to get into Nott Manor. Andromeda was watching him with an oddly soft expression that brought to mind uncomfortable recollections of a quiet voice singing him lullabies. Narcissa's eyes were slightly narrowed, and as he met her gaze it flicked between him and Granger.

"We would have got you out regardless." Granger said from beside him, her voice starting tremulous but gaining conviction. "You were never a Death Eater, the charges put against you were ridiculously trumped up."

When Theo turned to look at her she was staring at the tabletop, a slight frown on her face. "Harry's right, you know, the Ministry are so desperate to look like they're on top of things that they'll lock up innocent people if they think it might help."

"Help?"

Finally, Granger raised her eyes to his. "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark," she said, smiling ruefully. _Not a smile_ , Theo thought, _a twist of the mouth_.

" _Hamlet_ ," he muttered, and saw her eyebrows twitch in surprise. "Please, Granger," he smirked, "Do you really think _The Tempest_ could have been written by a Muggle?"

Her nose wrinkled, and Theo had to remind himself of the matter at hand. "Your ignorance aside," he said, disregarding the little bolt of pleasure when her eyes sparked, "What do you mean?"

"I told you the Ministry's corrupt from top to bottom, and so they're willing to ignore the fact that the Department of Mysteries is _oozing_ magic -" Granger started, but she was cut off.

"They did something," Narcissa said, "Before the Unspeakables were able to seal it off, the Dark Lord did _something_ to disrupt the magic held within the Department."

"Disrupt?" Theo asked.

"The Department of Mysteries is the oldest part of the Ministry," Andromeda said. "And the magic contained there is of a nature quite unlike the spells that we use everyday."

"Fundamental," Theo murmured, remembering the odd little book that Granger had given him to read the day before.

"Quite," Andromeda nodded. "And if the fundamentals of magic are compromised, then -"

"Magic itself is corrupted," Theo finished, feeling the weight of comprehension descend upon him. He found himself looking at Granger, "Are you sure?"

She held his gaze, worrying at her lower lip. "Tempers are frayed," she said slowly. "It's not overly noticeable yet but there are spells that are becoming warped, enchantments that are failing or getting too strong." A little grimace, "Ghost sightings among Muggles are up, and there have been three Seers hospitalised in the past two months with fractured visions. One of them had never been Visited before."

Theo let himself digest this before he responded, "But the - the -" Theo swallowed, willed himself to say the name - " _Voldemort'_ s defeat would have discharged a huge volume of magical energy, would it not? Couldn't it be that?"

"If that was the case we'd expect it to be levelling out," Granger said, the corners of her mouth tightening, "But I told you, it's getting stronger."

"Whatever was done, we need to undo it," Andromeda said. "But we can't without knowing what actually happened, and given his...fascination with it, then our best source of information is going to be your father's research."

"Why aren't you talking to him then?" Theo asked boldly. He'd refused to ask about his father up until now, but the not knowing was killing him.

Narcissa's jaw clenched gently once more. "None of us can get permission to visit Azkaban. They won't even let me see Lucius, let alone Thoros."

"He's alive then." Theo sat back, unsure how the knowledge made him feel.

 _Azkaban was no more than the old man deserved._

 _A mind of winter._

"There was an argument for the Kiss." Granger spoke softly, as though afraid of the effect that her words might have, "But the Dementors have been...uncooperative."

He looked at her and she met his gaze determinedly. "You think that's another symptom of this...whatever this is," he said.

"Yes," Granger nodded. "Yes I -"

A door slammed somewhere overhead and Theo jumped. They could hear voices yelling at one another from one of the upper floors, and Andromeda got hastily to her feet. "Not again," she murmured, "They're going to wake Teddy, let alone -"

" _FILTH!_ " came a shriek from the hallway, " _STAINS UPON THE MEMORY OF MY ANCESTORS!_ _MUDBLOODS POLLUTING THE DOORSTEP OF THIS HOUSE!"_

"Shit," Granger breathed, scrambling up from the table as Andromeda hurried out of the kitchen in the direction of the entrance hall.

"Well fucking _done_ , Ginny, now you've gone and -" Theo recognised the voice as Potter's before he was once again drowned out by the screeching of the painting.

" _TRAIPSING THEIR UNCLEANNESS ACROSS MY -"_

"Nice deflection, Harry, but it wouldn't be a problem if you didn't insist on staying in this house and fighting _another bloody crusade_!" He hadn't known Ginny Weasley well enough at school to recognise her voice straight away, and now it was shrill, distorted by anger.

Granger paused as she was about to follow Andromeda. When she looked at Theo he saw that her face had paled, that her eyes were wide with indecision.

"It isn't a crusade, Gin, this is important you have to -"

" _BLOOD TRAITORS! SHAMELESS PERVERSIONS OF OUR NOBILITY!"_

"I don't have to ANYTHING! I am _done_ , do you hear me?"

"You know what? _Fine!"_

" _FINE!"_

There was a crash that echoed through the whole house as someone threw the front door closed with enough force to wake the dead, let alone a painting, and Narcissa sighed as she, too, rose from the table.

"Stay here," she said, raising her voice so as to be heard over the continued noise from the hallway. "You too, Hermione."

Granger nodded and slipped into the seat that Andromeda had recently vacated, opposite Theo. Her hands were shaking, he noted, when she placed her wand on the table. He waited until the noise from the hallway died down, Narcissa apparently having successfully subdued her aunt, before he spoke.

"What was that?"

The look that she gave him was stark in its misery. "Emotions running high," she said. "It's been going that way for a while now, but I'm sorry you had to -"

"Well that's that." Potter came marching into the kitchen and threw himself down next to Granger, who gave him a nervous look.

"It did sound a bit more...final this time," she said eventually.

Potter sighed, looking down at his hands. "She was never going to be on board with this," he said. "She's had enough of my hero complex to last her a lifetime, apparently." Theo watched as the other man gave himself a little shake, and then looked up with a grim smile.

"I'm sorry, Nott. Hardly the welcome that I wanted to give you to my house."

Theo considered him for a moment, uncertain of where they stood after Potter had walked out so abruptly the night before. "Think nothing of it," he said eventually.

Potter's eyes flashed behind his glasses, but a hint of warmth entered his smile.

 **OOOOO**

Hermione watched the two young men from the corner of her eye as she made coffee at the stove. Andromeda and Narcissa had not reappeared, probably now preoccupied with getting Teddy up and dressed for the day.

It was a strange household, certainly, but they had all grown rather accustomed to one another over the past six months.

She wondered briefly what it would be like without Ginny's whirlwind of energy around, and Hermione found herself admitting, with her back turned to Harry, what a relief it would be not to have the constant tension of their relationship to worry about. She loved Ginny dearly, but the youngest Weasley wanted nothing to do with their plans, was adamant that _they_ didn't need to do anything either, and Hermione was tired of the circular argument.

" _Why does it always have to be you lot?"_ Ginny had yelled a couple of weeks ago, " _Why can you not just let somebody else take responsibility?"_

" _Because no-one else is stepping up!"_ Harry had roared back, " _I'm not going to walk away from this, Ginny."_

Theo laughed quietly behind her at something that Harry said, snapping Hermione back to the present. The laughter was a relief somehow, although she was fairly sure that he'd be back to glaring at her soon enough.

Hermione frowned and flicked a warming charm at the coffee pot, mentally calculating how long to hold it for in order to ensure that the grounds didn't burn. She'd never been particularly good at domestic charms of any sort, and by god they had suffered because of it during the year hunting horcruxes, but since Andromeda had taken charge of the house the older witch had been generous in teaching her whenever Hermione asked, and she had been surprised to discover that she found it relaxing. She still preferred doing things the Muggle way in her own home but Grimmauld Place, as an entirely wizarding house, didn't have electricity or gas, making charms a necessity.

Her mind drifted again as she counted down from sixty seconds, recalling how, the day after the Battle, Andromeda had shown up on the doorstep with Teddy. Harry, Ron and Hermione had gaped at her and the shrunken travelling trunk dangling from her wrist, until she raised a single imperious eyebrow. "Are you going to let me in, or aren't you?"

It turned out that she had just spent an hour visiting with Narcissa, who had managed to impart as much of the limited information that she had gathered as was possible under the scrutiny of the Aurors. Andromeda was worried, frightened, and purposeful. She had taken charge of the house almost immediately, and after the trio's panicked ransacking of the Black library to try and work out what _the hell_ Narcissa's cryptic note meant, it had been a relief to let someone else order them about.

Narcissa's trial had been set for two days later, the Ministry keen to be seen to be _doing_ something. When Harry had marched in to speak for the Defence it had thrown the whole thing into disarray. With the resulting uproar as cover, Hermione had stolen down to the cells, armed with a book of some of the darkest magic she'd ever seen, in order to set stronger wards on Nott's cell and lay the groundwork to break Malfoy out.

" _Why not take them both at the same time?" she asked Andromeda. "Why leave Nott in there?"_

 _For a moment Andromeda's steely expression wavered, and Hermione glimpsed the well of grief behind it. The woman had just lost her daughter and son-in-law, hard on the heels of her husband, and it suddenly occurred to Hermione that this mission, this purpose, might be all that was holding her together._

 _Then Andromeda turned to look at Teddy, whose hair was the sandy shade of Remus's; whose eyes were the deep grey that Tonks had inherited from her mother. Something about the child seemed to harden Andromeda's resolve, because when she glanced back at Hermione her mouth was set. "Because one of them should be lawfully released," she said, "and it won't be Draco."_

 _She paused, seemed to choose her next words carefully. "Theo has endured worse."_

The pot gave a chirp to indicate that the coffee was brewed, and Hermione summoned mugs from the cupboard just as the kitchen door swung open to admit Narcissa and Andromeda, who was carrying Teddy on her hip.

"Nee!" the little boy squealed, his hair turning into a nest of wild curls as he reached for her. Behind Andromeda the door opened again and Malfoy slipped inside, his cheeks, pink with cold, indicating that he had just arrived back at the house.

Hermione laughed, setting the coffee pot on the table and ignoring Malfoy's smirk as he sat down next to Harry. She plucked Teddy from Andromeda's arms and then settled on the bench next to Nott with the child in her lap.

"I ran into the charming Weaselette in the street," Malfoy said to Harry. "Apparently the fireworks display has been called off?" Harry choked on the mouthful of coffee that he had just taken.

"Bloody hell, Malfoy," he muttered, casting a quick _Evanesco_ over the stain on his front. "Give me some warning?"

"Language," Andromeda reprimanded him drily, from where she had started pulling ingredients from the pantry, obviously meaning to get a head start on lunch. Narcissa merely smiled thinly at them from where she was sat, ramrod straight, at the head of the table.

"I see no reason to step delicately around the issue, Potter," Draco remarked, studying his immaculate fingernails, "Since you have hardly been discreet about your dramatics over the past couple of months."

Hermione saw Harry consider snarking back, turning it into an argument, and then decide not to, the tense line of his shoulders relaxing as he gave a defeated little laugh. "I think it's for the best," he conceded quietly.

Malfoy pursed his lips but he couldn't disguise the mischievous light in his eyes when he looked at Hermione, and she rolled hers at him in exasperation. He and Harry had reached a sort of _entente cordiale_ over the past few months, and their bickering lacked the venom that had characterised their exchanges at school. Malfoy shot her a grin as he sipped his coffee, and then his eyes wandered to Nott, a small frown appearing on his face.

Hermione turned to see Nott gazing, apparently fascinated, at Teddy where he sat in her lap. The toddler was playing with one of Hermione's long curls, but he was returning Nott's stare, babbling away happily.

"What are you up to, hm?" she murmured, jiggling her knees and making Teddy squawk with delight. He turned his gaze up to her, and Hermione had to swallow her shock when she saw his eyes.

It usually took Teddy a few days to warm up to somebody new sufficiently to start mimicking them, but if his hazel-green irises were any indication he had taken to Nott right away. "Oh," Hermione breathed, raising her eyes to look at Nott again. He was still staring, and she fought to keep her voice light as she said, "Metamorphmagus. Obviously he likes you."

Nott gave a tight little nod, and Hermione flicked her eyes to Malfoy, hoping he might give her some indication of how to proceed but he, too, was frowning at Teddy, and Hermione suddenly realised that the little boy's hair was still a shorter version of her own. A quick glance at Narcissa, whose eyebrows were fractionally raised, confirmed the impression, and Hermione stood quickly, hefting Teddy, who whooped, and then depositing him in Harry's lap.

"I need some air," she announced to no one in particular, before marching from the room in the direction of the front door.

When Harry came and sat beside her on the front steps ten minutes later, placing a fresh cup of coffee in her hands, she sagged against him with relief. "That was weird," he said, and she groaned her agreement, feeling his cheeks shift as he smiled.

"How is it?" he asked eventually, his voice muffled against her hair.

"It's _weird_ ," Hermione said, parroting him unthinkingly. "It's like, like...two steps forward and then twelve steps back, and he's - he's -" she gave a little growl of frustration. "At least with Malfoy he's just a _prick_."

Harry huffed a laugh. "Yeah, Merlin, you can say that again."

For a moment they sat in comfortable silence, before Hermione asked, "You're ok? About Ginny?"

Harry grimaced, "Malfoy was right, prick though he is. Ginny and I have been on the rocks for months." He sighed, slumping a little. "If I'm honest, it's a relief. This - this thing we're doing - she just wants to play quidditch and have a normal life, and I can't give her that. It's better this way."

Hermione hummed in agreement, and they sat quietly again, before Harry shifted to look down at her. "So if Nott isn't a prick, what is he?"

She considered the question for a moment, but then the words came tumbling out. "He's like a walking wound," she whispered. "And I never realised." She bit her lip, unsure how much of Nott's history she could share with Harry. It felt wrong somehow, to divulge something so personal without his permission.

"He stares at you," Harry said, when it became clear she wasn't going to say anything else, and Hermione felt herself blush deeply. "When you're not looking. It's like he can't believe you're real."

"I don't know about that," she demurred, though she couldn't help remembering the darkness in Nott's eyes when he'd swiped the blood from her neck; the way he had tracked the progress of her blush. "I think he's fighting the instinct to murder me for being annoying."

"Trust me," Harry said. "That was not the expression of a man contemplating murder." He gave a rueful grin, "And anyway, all you'd have to do is tell him not to, and he'd have to stop."

"Don't remind me," Hermione said, screwing her eyes shut. "That fucking vow."

"We'll get it lifted," Harry assured her, rubbing her arm comfortingly. "And then he can murder you to his heart's content."

There was a beat while his words sat in the air, and then they both started laughing at the same time. "You always know just what to say," Hermione gasped eventually, which only set them both off again, the laughter hopeless, bordering on hysteria.

* * *

 ** _A/N:_** _For all you lovelies with your gorgeous reviews - especially **brigittar** \- sorryyyy._


	11. Chapter 11

**_A/N:_** _As ever, real life got in the way of my best intentions! Thank you everyone for your lovely lovely reviews - I hope you continue to enjoy._

* * *

 **11: Tell**

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Harry left Hermione alone on the doorstep soon after, wanting to get his weekly haranguing of the Minister over and done with. When she returned to the kitchen it was to find that Malfoy and Nott had also disappeared off somewhere.

"They're in the library," Narcissa said quietly, before Hermione could even ask the question. The blonde witch didn't look up from the picture book that she was showing to Teddy, whose hair had returned to its usual soft turquoise.

"I think Theodore wanted a chance to speak to Draco alone," Andromeda said from where she stood by the large range oven, stirring something heavenly-smelling on the hob.

Hearing the unsaid words, Hermione nodded. "Can I help you with lunch? How many will we be today?"

"That's kind of you dear," Andromeda said, shooting her a smile. "Can you start laying the table? I think we'll be eight, not counting Teddy of course."

"Eight?" Hermione asked, as she levitated plates from the dresser to the tabletop.

"Harry if he's back in time, then I think Luna said she was going to try and bring Pansy. So with us three and the boys then that's eight, isn't it?"

"Oh. Yes." Hermione felt her shoulders droop slightly at the thought of Pansy, though she couldn't deny that the Slytherin girl had improved significantly since they were at school. Almost to the point where Hermione might have considered forgiving her for trying to give Harry up to Voldemort.

Almost.

 _Although that was probably a little hypocritical_ , Hermione thought to herself, glancing towards Narcissa as she started to set out the plates and cutlery. She was surprised to find the other woman watching her, a strange, thoughtful expression on her face.

"What is it?" Hermione asked, and Narcissa blinked, frowning slightly.

"Nothing," she said eventually, pausing a little before she said, "It was just the light there, for a moment -"

"Cissy." Andromeda's voice was sharp and Hermione stared at her in surprise. For a second there was silence in the room as Andromeda frowned and stared into the middle distance, before she finally looked back at Hermione.

"Sometimes you have a look about you," she said. "And you remind of us someone, but we are never quite sure who." She turned her head slightly to the side, eyes searching Hermione's face. "It's the damnedest thing," she said softly.

Hermione felt a strange desire to laugh, could feel a blush rising in her cheeks, and swept a hand into her hair self-consciously. After a moment Andromeda gave herself a little shake. "Maybe it's just the deportment lessons," she said with a little smile. "There were so many of us in those classes at Twilfitt and Tattings every summer, you probably look like one of those girls."

Narcissa did laugh then, and Teddy gurgled gleefully in response, dispelling the odd atmosphere in the room. Hermione smiled too, though a little shiver made its way down her spine as she set out the last of the plates.

 **OOOOO**

"So," Draco drawled, "Granger."

"What about her?" Theo asked, trying not to betray anything in his voice as he perused the titles of the books in front of him.

He wasn't surprised that Granger had been able to find the spells to ward his cell in this library. Volumes bound in dark leather sat heavily on the shelves, malevolence leaking from them like a living force. Theo couldn't deny his own fascination, his desire to read and _learn_.

There was an essential difference between wanting to understand the magic for its own sake, and wanting to use it on someone. Theo had spent most of his summers with only house elves for company, and so had known an entrail-expelling curse as a useful spell for the preparation of poultry until he had seen it put to gruesome use by Alecto Carrow during the Battle of Hogwarts.

He clenched his teeth, determined not to gag at the memory, and allowed his hand to drift across the dark spines, not touching any of them. He was waiting for Draco to say something else.

 _Patience_.

 _A mind of winter._

And then, "Is the bossiness any easier to deal with if you've sworn obedience?" Draco was obviously aiming for a mocking tone but there was something off in his delivery, and Theo turned to give him a pointed look over his shoulder.

"That isn't funny," he said, unable to stop himself thinking of Granger's wide eyes, of her hands on his chest. The feel of her ribs, of her quick, shallow breaths, against him.

The bright scarlet of her blood on his fingertip.

His hand jerked involuntarily, landing against one of the books and Theo drew it from the shelf to disguise the movement, though he knew that Draco would have caught it.

"If you say so," the other wizard said tartly as Theo looked away from him, and he fought the urge to roll his eyes while Draco couldn't see.

It would seem that being declared dead had done nothing to dispel the Malfoy petulance.

"She's trying very hard not to tell me to do anything," Theo said quietly after a moment, feigning nonchalance as he perused the volume in his hands. He wasn't able to hide the curl of his lip as he realised it was an arcane treatise on time magic.

"She is?" Draco asked, his surprise evident in the uncharacteristic eagerness of his tone. Theo looked up from the entirely-too-gleeful discussion of the infamous Eloise Mintumble case and met Draco's eyes.

How strange to have grieved for him so long, and now to have him stand here, alive and well and as over-interested in Theo's business as he had ever been.

Theo closed the book with a snap. "I think she feels guilty about it," he said evenly.

"Ah, how typical." Draco smiled slightly, "Saints Potter, Granger and Weasley. Never-ending martyrdom."

"More believable than Saint Malfoy. Or Nott." Theo felt his mouth pull itself into a half-smile as Draco snickered.

"True," Draco leaned back against the wall. "I will be remembered as a martyr to my own stupidity, it would seem."

Theo frowned, "If this - whatever this is - that you lot are doing works, then surely you won't have to keep pretending to be dead?"

"Perhaps," Draco said. "But then, you've rather struck upon the crux of the matter."

"How so?"

"None of us know what the fuck we're doing," Draco sighed and looked down at the shining toes of his oxfords. "We've got a hastily-cobbled set of notes from my mother and six months of arithmantic readings on the magic that the Department of Mysteries is exuding."

"You've been taking those?" Theo asked, remembering Draco's head for numbers.

"Astonishing what you can get away with when you're handy with a Disillusionment Charm," Draco confirmed.

"But Potter has an invisibility cloak," Theo said, "Surely that would be less risky than -"

Draco shook his head. "The magic's all wrong. It plays up around the Department," he said. "Creates an empty patch in the air. I nearly got caught when I tried it, it was lucky Weasel was there to spot it."

"Ron Weasley saved _your_ neck?" Theo asked disbelievingly, thinking of the hard look in the Junior Auror's eyes as he stood in Granger's kitchen the night - _fuck, only the night before?_

"Percy, actually," Draco replied, and Theo recalled the clerk at his trial who had read off the list of his supposed crimes so dispassionately.

"What does Percy Weasley have to do with any of it?" he growled.

Draco smirked at him. "Well, aside from being rather good at Arithmancy himself, he's also one of the finest legal brains of our generation, Theodore," he drawled. "Unfortunately for the Ministry, it makes him very aware of just how far the law is being twisted, and very willing to twist it right back."

"Commuting my sentence," Theo said slowly, "That would have been his idea?"

"Very good, Theo." Draco nodded, "Glad the months of imprisonment haven't completely dulled your intellect."

Theo glared at him, caught between stunned anger that Draco would _dare_ , and resigned amusement that _of course he fucking would._

He chewed the inside of his cheek. "Plenty of time to think," he said eventually. "You'd probably benefit."

Draco gave a low laugh, then looked up at him, grey eyes turning serious. "I know it was bad," he said, "I do know that, Theo."

"Well," Theo said, replacing the book. "At least I'm alive." He raised an exaggeratedly scornful eyebrow at the other wizard, "Unlike some people." There was a pause while they held one another's gaze, nearly twenty years of friendship finding its footing on newly uncertain ground.

"You think we're fucked," Theo said quietly, breaking the long moment of silence.

"Not fucked, exactly." Draco rolled his shoulders, a halfway shrug. "We just don't have enough information to know what we're doing."

Theo watched the resignation cloud his friend's face. "They said - your mother and your aunt - that we need to get into the library at Nott Manor."

Draco gave a curt nod, "It was your father's notes that my mother copied. He was working on this for the Dark Lord for a while, by her account, making Nott Manor our best bet."

"Lucky me," Theo sighed. "Breaking through Father's wards is sure to be a delightful experience." He rubbed a hand over his face before looking back at Draco. "You've checked the Malfoy library already, I'm guessing?"

The question was met with only a low, humourless laugh as Draco's face set with misery. "What?" Theo asked.

"Since I'm dead, my father is imprisoned, and my mother is under house arrest as a ward of my aunt, Malfoy Manor has come into the possession of the Ministry," he said, his tone bitter.

"They can't!" Theo spluttered, "What about Narcissa? What about -"

"Both our fathers are serving life-sentences, Theo," Draco said, "And in case you haven't noticed, the Ministry appears to be doing largely whatever the _fuck_ it wants, which is why we find ourselves in this pretty little dilemma." He paused, taking a shaky breath. "Anyway, Potter and Granger managed to get hold of the inventory, and there's nothing on there that we think would help." His mouth twisted contemptuously. "We got rather used to Ministry raids between the wars. Father was _most_ thorough about purging the Manor of anything particularly suspect."

Theo had always nursed a quiet envy that Draco had a father like Lucius; cool and controlled, sardonic and calculating.

 _What have you done, Thoros?_

He flinched, hating the memory, and forced himself to focus. There was something in the way that Draco said 'Father' that wasn't right, that spoke of resentment and fear; that sounded, in short, too close to the way that Theo himself would say the word.

His eyes went to his friend's left arm. _Marked at sixteen_. And who would have let that happen, whose hand would have held Draco's shoulder as Voldemort carved himself into his flesh? When he looked back at Draco's face it was to see him grimacing, and Theo opened his mouth, unsure quite what he was going to say, when a silvery streak of light appeared between the two of them.

Theo blinked in surprise, noting the sleek, otter shape of the Patronus. _Granger_ , he knew, even before the thing spoke with her voice. "Lunch is ready, if you'd like to come down."

As the silvery otter disappeared with a flicker of light Theo met Draco's eyes again, to see the blonde wizard's expression had cleared. "You weren't kidding about her not telling you what to do," he chuckled, "Were you?"

 **OOOOO**

Somehow lunch drifted into tea and biscuits, which soon became dinner, and Hermione only realised that it was getting late when she caught herself yawning. Andromeda had taken Teddy off to bed nearly an hour before, and the rest of the company were scattered around the drawing room.

Nott was engrossed in quiet conversation with Narcissa over by the window, one of her hands resting gently on his arm where it was folded in front of him.

Luna had, as promised, brought Pansy over for lunch, and apart from a quite predictably melodramatic reaction to seeing Nott again the Slytherin witch had actually proven herself quite bearable company. She and Luna were sat either side of Harry on one of the sofas, and though Hermione couldn't hear what was being said she could guess from Harry's blush that they were talking about his break-up with Ginny.

Her eyes drifted back to Nott, taking in his sharp slimness, the way his long fingers tapped a nervous beat against his biceps even as he listened to Narcissa with rapt attention.

"You know, if it's Legilimency you're trying, it works best with eye contact." Hermione jumped as Malfoy's low voice spoke in her ear, and heard him laugh quietly at her.

"How does he seem to you?" she asked, not bothering with niceties as she turned her eyes away from Nott to study Malfoy's face.

He gave her a sharp look, and she could see him weighing up whether to answer her properly.

"Please, Draco," she murmured.

He blinked at the unexpected use of his first name. His pale gaze, usually so direct, skittered away from hers to look at Nott. "Better than I expected," he said gently, "And worse, too."

Hermione huffed with frustration, and he smiled slightly. "He's angry, but he's glad to be out, and I think he'll be willing to help." He looked back at her, "He knows you're being careful about the Vow, and I think he's grateful."

"Stupid fucking Ministry," Hermione said, her tiredness making her more irritable than usual.

Malfoy's eyebrows quirked. " _Language_ , Granger. My my." He shook his head, "After all my mother's efforts to turn you into a lady, too."

"Yes, well." Hermione said, rubbing her arm unthinkingly, "Breeding will out, I guess."

She saw him pale slightly from the corner of her eye, and realised how it must have looked. "Malfoy, that wasn't -"

"Don't," he said, "I didn't - I never thought that she'd -"

"Hermione." Narcissa was suddenly there, as though she had been able to sense her son's distress from across the room. "It's getting late. Perhaps you should take Theodore home?" She gave Hermione a pointed glare, and she scrambled to get up from the sofa.

"Yes," she said, "Yes I think that's a -" she stopped, inhaled, and looked back down at Malfoy, placing a hand on his shoulder. "I don't blame you," she whispered as he looked up at her. "I never did."

She realised the truth of it only as she said the words, and before he could make any reply she had crossed the room to Nott, ignoring the curiosity in his gaze as she jerked her head towards the door. "Time to head home, I think."

 **OOOOO**

He wasn't sure what had passed between Draco and Granger, only that she seemed curt and irritable as she herded him towards the Floo, barely pausing to say goodbye to Potter and Lovegood.

"I'm going to bed," she announced as soon as they were back in her book-lined sitting room and she had flicked her wand to illuminate the lamps. "You do -" Theo watched, fascinated, as she screwed her eyes shut in frustration, her brows pulling together briefly before she looked at him. "I'll leave you to your own devices," she said stiffly, before turning on her heel and marching up the stairs.

It was a relief, he told himself, to have some time alone without her hovering presence. He turned to the shelves, lined with multicoloured Muggle books: a literal world away from the uniformly cumbersome and threatening collection in the Black family library. Theo removed one at random and settled himself into an armchair, noting as he did so that the cushions had been charmed to form themselves into as comfortable an arrangement as possible.

Two hours (and a new appreciation for Tolstoy) later, he started wearily up the stairs, his thoughts a slow consideration of the beautiful, elegant prose that he had just read. Wizarding fiction often left a great deal to be desired, but while Theo had been able to peruse some Muggle books while at school he hadn't been stupid enough to attempt to read them at home, and so the selection available to him had been rather limited.

And now the promise of possibility; of freedom. The Vow weighing, all of a sudden, a little less heavily upon him. "A partner, not a tool," Theo murmured to himself as he reached his bedroom door.

He almost missed the faint cry from the floor above; would have ignored it if he hadn't heard the words.

"Please - please no - it isn't - we didn't -"

He felt his stomach drop, was running up the stairs and through the door to her bedroom before he had even considered what he was doing.

She hadn't pulled the curtains, and in the moonlight he could see Granger was curled tight in a ball on her bed, the sheets twisted around her. As Theo skidded to a halt, staring at her, she let out a low scream and started to thrash. "No! Please no! Please stop!"

It was the Vow, he told himself, as he scrambled onto the bed behind her. The Vow that made him take hold of her flailing arms and pull her against him. The Vow that kept his voice low and quiet and made him whisper, "You're safe, you're safe," over and over.

He felt her wake up; felt her take a large, shuddering breath, her ribs expanding back against him and the tension leaving her body in a rush.

It wasn't the Vow that kept him holding onto her as she shook and sobbed. It wasn't the Vow that drew his eyes to the scar that crawled across her forearm, dark in the moonlight.

She pushed herself back from him eventually, giving a small, bitter laugh and swiping at her eyes. "In case you thought you were the only one who has nightmares," she said quietly.

"You don't take Dreamless Sleep?" he asked.

Granger shuddered. "Would you?" she replied, looking up at him, her dark eyes shining in the low light.

She was laying her fear out in front of him, deliberately vulnerable. Part of Theo wondered whether it was a test, but then he looked into her eyes and felt something twist inside him. _So much damage_ , he thought, as he remembered Draco's grimace, Potter's anger, Weasley's hard stare.

She hadn't told him to tell the truth, so he could choose - could choose -

 _A mind of winter._

"No," he breathed, unable to lie to her. "No, I wouldn't."

* * *

 _ **A/N:** For **pianomouse** for having the cutest name, **jhuffy** because I left you daydreaming longer than I meant to, and **percabethfrazel** from tumblr because oh eep I hope you like it!_


	12. Chapter 12

_**A/N:** Honestly at this stage I'm not sure why I'm even pretending that I'm sticking to an update schedule... **Warning** : mention of rape and generalised violence._

* * *

 **12: Bend**

* * *

Theo woke to the warmth of sunlight on the back of his neck and the rain-and-roses scent of Granger's hair filling his nose. He realised that he was curled around her, that his face was buried in the back of her neck, mouth almost touching the nub of bone at the top of her spine.

He froze, noting that he was still wearing the muggle jeans and jumper from the day before, and trying to remember falling asleep, before Granger shifted in his arms, turning over to stare into his eyes.

Their faces were very close together; Theo could feel the eddying current of their breath as it swirled between them. Again he sensed it, that gentle pull that he told himself was the Vow, the faint hint of vertigo drawing him to her. Granger blinked, not moving otherwise, and he could feel the tension of her muscles, the patient waiting. He swallowed and leaned away, pulling his arm from beneath her and rising from the bed.

He didn't look back as he slipped out of the door, as he made his way down to the kitchen where a flick of his wand had the kettle whistling steam. Granger entered and he wordlessly passed her a mug of tea, made just as he had watched her do it: Earl Grey with the barest dash of milk.

She took the mug from his hand, offering him a murmured "Thank you," without looking at him before moving to sit at the table, pulling a book towards her from the stack that she had left the day before.

Theo sipped his own tea, leaning back against the kitchen counter and watching her for a long moment, noting the determined force of her attention on the book; the too-casual blankness of her expression.

 _A mind of winter._

He leaned over to the pile of books and lifted one off the top, settling himself opposite her and opening it to the first page.

 **OOOOO**

The days passed like this, the pair of them migrating from the kitchen to the sitting room to Grimmauld Place and back again. Hermione checked books off her reading list, compared her notes to Nott's; pulled more heavy volumes from the shelves at Grimmauld and carried them back through the Floo to read in the relative quiet of her own home.

She took Nott for long walks around a nearby park, distracting him from the sheer proliferation of Muggles by quizzing him about the novels that he devoured every evening. To her surprise Nott became almost talkative when discussing books, and she found it easy to tease him, to draw him out further with quiet questions, tipping her head thoughtfully and feeling a flutter in her stomach when she saw his eyes follow the motion, cataloguing the emotions that flitted across his face as he answered her.

They didn't mention the morning that he had woken up in her bed, and after that night Hermione was careful to place silencing charms on her room before she went to sleep. She assumed that Nott did the same, because she hadn't heard him cry out again. From the shadows under his eyes, and the hunted expression he wore most mornings when he appeared in the kitchen, she guessed that the ghosts of his past still disturbed his sleep.

Though she and Harry had planned for her and Nott to move into Grimmauld as soon as he seemed up to it, the insistent attentions of the Aurors made this impossible. By the end of the first fortnight of Nott's release Hermione's house had been inspected five times, and it became clear that Davies had no intention of leaving them be.

"Honestly, Hermione," he drawled the next time she let him in, stalking past her and starting up the stairs to the sitting room. "Aren't you getting bored of your little rehabilitation experiment yet?" He twirled his wand between his fingers and grinned nastily at Theo, who glowered at him from the armchair.

"It isn't an experiment," Hermione said evenly, following him into the room and folding her arms so that Davies wouldn't see her knuckles whiten as she squeezed her hands into fists. "Nott is innocent, he doesn't need rehabilitating."

Davies laughed harshly. "Nott was found guilty by the Wizengamot and by rights he should be in Azkaban," he said, voice low and venomous. "Whatever fucked-up little crusade you and Potter are leading, you need to stop." He pushed himself away from the bookcase he had been leaning on and advanced towards her. "I don't know who's been teaching you how to play politics, _Granger_ , but you've got your little Slytherin puppet now. This needs to _stop_."

They were nearly nose to nose, and Hermione glared back at him. "He isn't a _puppet_ ," she insisted, "and it won't stop. The Ministry is _rotten_ , Roger, and I will play whatever games I need to to try and _fix it_."

"You meddling _bitch_ , Granger, you need to learn to leave things -"

"I think that's enough, don't you?"

Nott's voice was even, but it came from closer than Hermione expected, and she realised that he was standing right behind her. She didn't need to look over her shoulder to feel the strength of the glare he was levelling at Davies, and she saw the other man blink, recoiling slightly.

"What a good little dog you are," he sneered. "Ready to defend your mistress." His eyes slid from Nott to Hermione. "I've wasted enough time here, so I'll just need you to demonstrate that the Vow is still in place, and then I'll be going. Tell Nott to stand still and stay silent."

Hermione swallowed, her mouth going dry. She knew Davies was aware of how much she hated this, how much she _loathed_ commanding Nott to do things. "Nott," she murmured, turning to look at him, stepping back slightly. "Please stand still, and don't say a word until I tell you to." He narrowed his eyes, and a muscle flickered in his cheek, but other than that he stood as though frozen.

"Good," Davies said, "Now -" he leaned close to Nott's ear, saying something in a tone too low for Hermione to catch, though she saw the other wizard go pale, his hazel eyes glittering with anger.

Davies stepped back, surveying Nott with satisfaction, and then threw Hermione a mocking nod. "Until next time," he said, turning on his heel and making his way downstairs.

Hermione waited until she heard the crack of disapparition before she looked back to Nott. "You can move now, and speak." She sighed, "What did he say?"

Nott's face was still white, and now the muscles tightened across it as she saw him struggle to keep a rein on his fury. "Nothing that bears repeating," he said eventually, between gritted teeth, before crossing to the stairs and climbing up them. She heard the door of his room slam and felt her heart sink.

 **OOOOO**

"Good thing she has you muzzled," Davies had breathed, "I've heard that Notts have trouble keeping their women in line."

 _Blood and his mother calling his name and the slash of his father's wand and Granger's eyes her eyes her mouth her scent her blood her blood her blood -_

There was a knock at his bedroom door. "Nott?"

 _A mind of winter_ , he told himself, as he rose from the bed and crossed to open it. "What?"

"I'm going to the Ministry." Granger had buttoned herself into formal robes and thrown a dark red cloak around her shoulders. With her hair swept away from her face to fall down her back she was a far cry from when she was wearing the casual, muggle clothing that seemed to be her go-to. It took him a moment to even register what she had said, but when he did he frowned. "So I'll need your wand."

"Why?"

"Because I have to ward you inside the house," she answered. At his glower she sighed, her shoulders drooping. "Davies is being a prick," she said bluntly, "And we need answers which we aren't getting from the Black library, which means we need to get into Nott Manor."

Theo had explained the problem a few days after his release, sitting at the table at Grimmauld Place with Granger, Potter, Draco and Narcissa.

" _It isn't the blood wards that are an issue," he'd told them. "It's the fact that my father made it unplottable."_

"I need to get the request for a visit with Thoros expedited, and I can't do that with you there," she said now, fixing him with the haughty look he knew she'd learned from Narcissa. It didn't suit her, he thought, the haughtiness. It made her beauty cold where it should be warm.

"What makes you think they'll let you? Narcissa can't get in to see Lucius."

"I'm not Narcissa," Granger said, "And your father is not -"

"Granger," he said flatly, "My father was one of the - the - Voldemort's," he spat the name as though it were poisonous, "Most trusted advisers." She made a frustrated gesture with her hand and he caught it, unthinking, gripping her fingers tightly. "Even if you can get in to see him you can't go alone, you can't -"

"Oh, is that right," she spat, suddenly furious. "I think I can handle visiting your father in prison, Nott. I fought in a war, you know. I wore _his_ bloody locket around my neck. I was tortured." She wrenched her hand from his, tugging her sleeve up to bare the scar from Bellatrix's knife. "I was ready to _die_ to stop Voldemort."

Theo laughed bitterly. "Oh well _done_ , Granger. How bloody brave of you." He felt years of fear and anger welling up inside him, and then suddenly they were spilling from his mouth. "Dying is easy," he spat, and her eyes gleamed but Theo pressed on. "If he'd ever got his hands on you Voldemort would have _obliterated_ you. He would have dug into your heart and pulverised everything you hold dear."

"Everything I hold dear was either right beside me fighting or already ripped away," she snarled, and he remembered what Draco had told him she had done to her parents.

"Was it?" Theo whispered, giving a tiny but emphatic shake of his head. "Doesn't matter. He'd have gone into your head and made you attach the very memory of everyone you've ever loved to pain and horror." He took her hand again, keeping his voice quiet and even, desperate to make her listen. "He would have had you violated in every way you can imagine. And if you thought that it was worth the sacrifice, he would have found everything you wished to save and ensured it was destroyed. And he would have bent your mind until you were _glad_."

He swallowed, feeling faintly ill, before he went on, "And my father would have watched, and laughed, and thought that you deserved all of it just because you weren't born in a Manor and your name isn't written in the book of sacred twenty-eight, and I don't want you going to seem him alone."

He paused, hearing the ricochet of his own wild heartbeat in his ears, then, "How do you think Bellatrix became as she was?"

Granger frowned at the sudden change in tack. "Bellatrix Lestrange was mad," she breathed, and he saw the glimmer of fear in her eyes as she remembered.

"No," another shake of his head. "No, Narcissa told us. Me and Draco, when she first escaped from prison. Bellatrix Black was _hungry_. She wanted power, she wanted knowledge. And _he_ filled her up so full of it that her mind burst its banks, and my father watched him do it."

Somehow his grip on her hand had drawn her closer, and there was barely any distance between them now, he realised, as she looked up at him.

"You're hungry too, Granger," he murmured, tilting his head thoughtfully, though it scared him to realise the truth of it. "And he - _Voldemort -_ he would have taken that hunger and used it to break you, because you do not know how to bend." He stretched his mouth into a small, joyless smile. "You do not know how to comply just enough that you can still hate yourself for what you do, because that's how you know that you remain your own. And my father will see that - he'll see it and he'll -"

He stopped, remembering the Carrow twins in his final year; remembered raising his wand on command, willing the spell to be gentle, gazing into the terrified eyes of the first-year students.

 _I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry -_

 _A mind of winter._

Granger didn't move, breathing his air. At this distance he could see the way that brown and gold mixed in her eyes, could smell the sharp, floral scent of her.

"Is that what you did then, Nott?" Her voice was low, the tone biting. "Did you comply just enough? Break just enough for him to believe that it was all the way?"

 _I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry._

Theo closed his eyes, too ashamed to hold her gaze, so he didn't see her lift her hand, only felt her run her finger gently down his cheek and across his bottom lip. He inhaled sharply, eyes opening to burn into hers.

"And what if I don't bend now?" she whispered, "Which of us will break then?"

"Tell me to break and I will," he said, his voice sounding suddenly breathless, even to himself. "For you, I will."

He felt for the fluttering tug that linked them, knew that if she commanded him he would not fight it. The desire was his: the need, the yearning for her - he couldn't fool himself into thinking it was a side-effect of the Vow. It was just _her_.

"No," Granger said, shaking her head violently and trying to push him away, "No, I won't, you can't-"

"I can bend instead," Theo heard himself say, as he caught her wrists to hold them between their bodies, leaning his head down to hover his mouth above hers.

Her breath tickled his lips.

"Not like this," she whispered, and then she was pulling her hands from his, taking his wand from his unresisting grasp and backing away towards the door, leaving him alone with his anger and his fear and the horror of his memories.

Alone in the house that felt empty as soon as she had left it, as much of a prison as the cells beneath the Ministry. It was the Vow that imprisoned him though, Theo told himself, but he knew that he was not so much captive as captivated. His awareness occupied at every moment with the knowing of _her_. The needing of her. He squeezed his shaking hands into fists and rested his forehead on the wall, trying to stamp down on the impotent rage that coursed through his blood.

By the time she returned it was late and Theo lay in bed listening to the weariness of her feet on the stairs. Listening as she paused outside his bedroom door, imagining her laying her fingers on the wood, before she continued upstairs.

He lay there, counting the minutes, trying to go to sleep and not dream of brown and gold. He was tired of fighting it; tired of fighting her.

When he pushed her door open he could see her eyes open, catching the faint gleam of light that spilled into the room behind him. Granger didn't say anything, but she moved over in the bed and Theo climbed onto it behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist and tucking his head into the back of her neck.

Even with her ridiculous hair, it seemed he could breathe easier here, her body a shield against his nightmares as he hoped his was for her.

 _Bend_ , he told himself. _Bend so as not to break._

 _A mind of winter._

* * *

 ** _A/N:_** _Thank you very much as always for all the review love - reading them makes my day! This chapter is for **eiralu** and others who have asked - I know where this is going, and I have every intention of getting it there, but my personal schedule means that updating more than once a week is difficult. __Unusually however I've actually got the next chapter at least partly written, so that should be out sooner rather than later. My other WIP, **How Do You Solve a Problem Like Ginevra** , is coming to a head though so trying to balance the two..._


	13. Chapter 13

**_A/N:_** _Thank you for coming back! Hope you enjoy..._

* * *

 **13: Hold**

* * *

At some point in the last few hours she had shifted in his arms and so Theo woke to darkness and a long curl tickling his face; to the itching readiness to sneeze. He blew the curl away, wrinkling his nose and creasing his forehead as he tried to fight the urge. After a moment it dissipated, and he was left to look at the deep brown richness of her hair, feeling the shape of her, the warmth in his arms, gentle and calm and filling him with urgency.

And it was like that, falling for her: like learning a spell and then casting it for the first time; like the slice of a wand, quick and decisive but loaded with a weight of knowing that made it irrefutable. He closed his eyes: blood on the walls, blood on the floor, blood in the raging of the heart he had thought walled off. Unseeing, he imagined the dusky softness of the nape of her neck, just inches from his face and calling to his mouth, demanding to be kissed.

Not the Vow, he knew. Another species of demand altogether.

As though she had heard the shout of his mind she shifted to face him, her eyes drinking in his face, a wide-open stare that saw and returned and allowed him to see. He hadn't known that she was awake, but the pull of her gaze drew her name to his mouth, a whisper in the darkness, sweet and perfect: "Hermione."

His lips pressed together on the "my" - stretched wide to fit it - a kiss of a name; a smile.

"Theo," she murmured, her voice sleepy, lips curving to return his smile. She placed her hand against his heart and he felt it leap at her touch, as though it would escape his chest and be held in her grasp. She burrowed deeper in his arms, brushing her lips along his collarbone, and he tightened his arms around her on instinct, wondering how awake she really was.

"You're so warm, Theo," she said, and he felt her sigh against him.

Theo had been raised cold, had felt the grip of frost upon his heart before he had ever known another season. But now he felt the terrifying promise of a thaw, and he swallowed the laugh that threatened at the idea that someone so radiant could find him _warm_.

He counted the rhythm of her breaths against him, felt his heart calm and beat slow and steady. His eyes fell closed as she turned over again, fitting the curve of her spine against his chest, and soon he was breathing with her, rise and fall, and tumbling back into the soft embrace of sleep.

 **OOOOO**

Draco dragged a hand over his face, feeling drained and tired. His extended wand arm shook slightly, and he forced himself to still it. _Two minutes_.

It took a quarter of an hour to collect a full arithmantic reading on the sealed entrance to the Department of Mysteries, and as the magic leaking around the edges of the gnarled wooden door strengthened it became increasingly taxing. He could feel sweat tracking its way down the valley of his spine, making the soft cotton of his shirt itch unpleasantly.

 _One minute_.

He fished in his pocket for the primer that Granger had found among Dumbledore's effects, tried to flick one-handed to the correct section, but found that his clammy fingers stuck to the thin pages.

Grimacing, Draco resolved to be patient. _Thirty seconds_. His wand started to vibrate as the spell neared completion, and he glanced over his shoulder to check that the corridor remained deserted. Apparently the Ministry remained content to deny that there was anything wrong with the Department, and that extended internally.

The tip of his wand glowed a pure, silvery blue, the light spilling out and away, coalescing into a sequence of runes that Draco didn't need to check the primer to know meant bad news.

He sighed, his shoulder aching from the effort of the spell. Dropping his arm, he fished a quill and parchment from his pocket and dutifully recorded the reading. Exponential growth. There could be no doubt now, and he had to consciously wrestle the frown from his face. A disillusionment charm could only cover so much, and if he wore a strong expression it wouldn't help.

With an effort he held his spine straight as he walked to the lift. It was always a risk to call it, but the Ministry stairs were as ancient as the Department of Mysteries: narrow and twisting and difficult to pass others on without arousing suspicion.

The lift arrived, the doors pinging open, and Draco felt himself relaxing as the grille pulled back to reveal Percy Weasley's expressionless face. He stepped into the wood-lined box, barely disturbing the air, but Percy shifted his weight and squinted towards him. "Draco?"

"Here." He leaned back into the wall of the lift, squaring his shoulders against the panelling.

Percy shot a squint-eyed look at him, gaze skittering at the edges of the Disillusionment Charm. "Any change?" he asked.

"Worse," Draco said. "Again. As ever."

Percy blew out a breath and matched Draco's exhausted posture in spite of the fact that he still could not see him properly. "We just have to hope that Hermione and Theodore manage to get something out of Thoros Nott this weekend."

"What?" Draco asked, his voice sharp enough to carry over the dulcet announcement of 'Atrium.' As the doors slid open he grabbed Percy's elbow, ignoring the other man's leap of surprise as unseen fingers closed around his arm, dragging him to a shadowed corner of the vast room.

"Granger got permission to visit _Thoros Nott?_ " he exclaimed quietly, fingers squeezing tight on Percy's biceps.

The other wizard didn't answer straight away, making a show of opening the folder that he carried and sliding a finger down the parchment. He looked up casually, ascertaining that none of the witches and wizards hurrying back and forth across the atrium were paying any attention to him before he spoke.

"Yes," he murmured. "The request for visitation has been in for about a month, but Hermione managed to get it expedited." Disapproval made Percy's mouth dip at one corner as he continued, "She stormed in here yesterday and made a big song and dance in front of the Wizengamot about how if they were going to let their Aurors run amok then they could at least allow her charge to see his father." A grudging smile, "I think the implication that there might be something in Nott Manor worth requisitioning was what swung it."

Draco ignored the wry humour. "You said Theo _and Hermione_ would be going," he hissed, and he saw Percy shoot him a sidelong glance, then hurriedly look back at the folder held open in his hands. "Surely you can't mean that she'll - that she'll -"

"Hermione will escort him for the whole visit," Percy said slowly, still directing his words down to the parchment in his hands. "She asked that Theodore be allowed to speak to his father to discuss matters of inheritance." Percy risked a glance upwards towards the patch of too-solid air that Draco occupied. "He's in her custody, so where he goes, she goes, and you know she's hardly going to entrust him to an Auror, even for half an hour in an Azkaban interview room." Again, Percy gave a dubious sidelong look. "Surely you can't think that the Wizengamot would ever have agreed for him to go unaccompanied?"

Draco thought of Thoros Nott's cruel sneer, of the way that Theo would flinch whenever voices had been raised in the Slytherin common room. He thought of Granger's wide, earnest eyes, the determined set to her jaw. The sound of her screams that night at Malfoy Manor, when Aunt Bella had taken her knife and -

"That isn't going to go well," he started, but Percy cut him off.

"It's going to go, and it's going to go tomorrow."

 **OOOOO**

"Granger!" It was early, but he'd been fairly certain that she would be up and had therefore been annoyed to arrive to find the house dark and still. He had let himself in, too riled to stand on courtesy, and had started up the stairs as he called out to her, irritation lending a growl to his voice.

"Granger, where the fuck are you?"

Above him floorboards creaked and he flung himself into the armchair in her sitting room, glowering towards the stairs that descended from the upper floor. There was a pile of books by his feet and in an effort to distract himself from his frustrated anger he picked them up, perplexed by the heaviness of the Muggle novels; the long, confusing titles. _Anna Karenina_. _Wuthering Heights_. _The Oresteia_.

Their pages were softly browned, the paper covers cracked and faded. Muggle books showed their age differently to the leather-bound parchment of wizarding volumes, seeming to soften into his hand, breathing the vanilla-scent of old paper as a warding against his sceptical frown.

"Malfoy." Granger's voice was sleepy as she emerged on the staircase. She yawned widely and flashed him a quick, tired smile. "How lovely to see you." In spite of her words she spared him little more than a glance as she continued down towards the kitchen. "I assume you didn't put any coffee on as you conducted your home invasion?"

His mouth had gone dry at the sight of her, dressed only in a thin cotton nightshirt which grazed the soft angles of her body. Her hair, wild with sleep, drifted in an untamed corona that remained visible several moments after the rest of her disappeared down the stairs.

He picked himself up from the armchair with a long-suffering sigh, just as Theo appeared on the stairs, boneless and languid in the way of the newly-awake.

"Draco," he nodded, stretching his arms above his head, sliding a small smile askance at him as he continued down the stairs, following Granger.

He dragged himself out of the chair, not wanting to argue with Granger in her own kitchen but unsure how he could do anything else. Because she couldn't be thinking of actually visiting with Thoros Nott. Surely she couldn't.

When he arrived in the kitchen he folded himself into one of the wooden chairs, watching Granger and Theo as they started preparing breakfast, moving about the small space in a neat pattern that spoke of the intimate synchronicity of those who know the shapes of one another's bodies. Theo lifted his hand to grab cups and Hermione's arm was raised to take the coffee from the cupboard; Theo murmured something inaudible and Hermione shook her head, prompting a toss of his.

"Honestly, Theo," Granger said as he moved around around her like a shadow, and her voice had a laugh to it that Draco hadn't heard before. But it was the way that she said Theo's name - that she said his _name_ \- that truly made him pause, and he felt his eyes grow sharp upon the pair of them, felt an unknown tightness in his chest, in his throat.

And there it was, suddenly: the hard, sharp pain of being too late, of seeing the way that her dark gaze rested, unwavering, on Theo.

Draco followed her eyes and felt something burning and true writhe to life in his stomach, slavering for attention, baying and breathing hotly on the back of his neck. Jealousy had a cruel grip, he reflected bitterly to himself, and he had known it often enough with Granger: top of the class, Potter's chosen ally. Her furious adherence to the truth that she had chosen.

He felt a rush of envy as Theo stepped behind her, and Draco realised that his friend stood close enough to Granger that the heat of their bodies must have intermingled, his sharp gaze searching for jagged edges between them and finding only an intricate dance.

And it was Theo, who was his best friend. Theo, who was still coiled tense as a spring, but in whose face Draco could see a cautious light whenever time his eyes met Granger's.

He swallowed, tasting the bitter pang that was at once grief and gladness.

"Are you alright, Malfoy?"

Granger was looking at him, her eyes sharp and bright and _seeing_ \- had she seen too much? he wondered, and he looked at Theo instead of answering, took in the small, tight frown that drew his brows together.

"Fine," Draco said, feeling his stomach roll, the metallic thickness across his tongue that was a prelude to vomiting. "I just remembered something I need to - I have to go, very sorry Granger, a thousand apologies, I -"

He talked himself out of the kitchen, and the last thing that he saw before he closed the front door and disapparated was the confusion on both of their faces.

* * *

 _ **A/N:** Maybe starting to answer questions a few people have had?_

 _I'm on holiday so erratic and useless and also quite drunk on Greek box-wine but **olivieblake** has assured me that this will do so please thank her for the update because she's the best alpha reader a heart could wish for. Also this is nearly at 400 reviews and I'm like, "huh?" but anyway thank you all and this chapter is for **amr56** for always responding with encouraging words, and **silverloveddragoness** because I love knowing that people are bingeing. _

_And also for everyone else, because it turns out box-wine makes me verbose and I would like to say to YOU - YES YOU, READING THIS - I love you, and thank you from the bottom of my heart for taking the time. I hope you enjoyed._


	14. Chapter 14

_**A/N:** Sorry about the wait - I'll let you get straight on with it!_

* * *

 **14: Break**

* * *

Theo stared at the coffee cup in his hand, still hearing the slam of the door; the crack of Draco's apparition.

Still seeing the blanched white of his face.

The cup was the one that he had been drinking from for weeks now: heavy earthenware with a chip on the brim, painted with multicoloured spots of colour. It had become his, just as this Muggle house had become home, and Theo marvelled at how very far from his childhood, from his life _before_ , this life was.

His life before. Nott Manor. His father. _Hermione_.

"What on earth was that about?" Her voice cut through his thoughts and Theo blinked, looking up from the cup still held loosely in his hand to study her face. She was standing close to him, her eyes soft and sleepy, the beginnings of a frown on her forehead, and he could smell her, feel the warmth of her body, and his head was full of the feel of her in his arms.

"I don't know," he said, thinking of the shock that he had seen in Draco's eyes. Shock, and a flash of pain.

 _You do not know how to bend_ , he had told her. But the look on Draco's face had been enough to remind Theo that for all that they had bent themselves to a madman's will they had ended up broken nonetheless.

Broken and useless and he couldn't let her, _couldn't have her, couldn't risk -_

Theo closed his eyes. Swallowed. He was dark, and cold, and undeserving, no matter what she might whisper in the night, and he felt the aching yawn of his past rise and engulf the hint of brightness that she had forced into his life.

 _A Nott must have a mind of winter._

He set the cup down on the counter. "You should have sent me away," he said, resting his hand on the wooden surface, staring at it rather than at her.

"What?" Her fingers on the back of his hand, and he pulled it away as though he had been burned, still refusing to look at her.

"Last night - you shouldn't - I can't, I'm not -"

"No." One word, but it sent a shiver down his spine. "No, that's - I'm not going to do that Theo - just because you're - you're -" he could hear the frustration building in her voice. "Do you think you could maybe look at me?"

Still so careful, so precise in her words even when she was shouting, even when bright spots of colour had risen in her cheeks and her eyes had lost their sleepiness and blazed at him.

 _Fuck_. Theo thought. _Fuck._ Because he couldn't look away. She didn't need a Vow to compel him, because he was fucking _lost_. The brightness was there again, taking root where before it had seemed there had only been a knot of pain and darkness, and as he looked into her eyes he remembered a whisper - long-buried, his mother's voice.

 _"Nothing is so beautiful as Spring."_

"Hermione," he said (wondering at it, marvelling, the sound on his lips) "Hermione, I can't, I'm not…" Her eyes held his, wide and worried and wonderful and terrible. "When I told you to bend," Theo whispered, "It's because I know what it is to be broken."

"Oh, Theo," she murmured, hand against his chest; against his heart which he could feel gaining pace again within the cage of his ribs. "You aren't," she said, eyes a promise, moving a step closer to him. "They didn't break you. And I won't let this break me."

 _They_. _This_. The Department of Mysteries. Nott Manor. _His father_.

Theo closed his fingers around her wrist. "You never told me," he said, thinking of Draco's skittish urgency, his insistent shouting. "What happened at the Ministry yesterday?"

She bit her lip, and Theo felt himself flooded with an utterly confusing mixture of desire and trepidation.

"Today," Hermione whispered. "We're going to see your father today."

 **OOOOO**

Draco hadn't known where to go. Grimmauld would be too many people, would be his mother and Aunt Andromeda. He wanted a drink - needed a drink - but dead men couldn't just walk into the Leaky Cauldron and demand a glass of Ogden's finest.

With seeming inevitability, he found himself back at the Ministry and Draco made sure his Disillusionment Charm was in place before he snuck in via the emergency staircase to make his way down to the DMLE and the tiny office that Potter and Granger had requisitioned for themselves.

Pausing a moment outside, Draco's eyes slipped across the sign in Potter's cramped, messy handwriting. _Department of Magical Oversight_. A stupid joke between all of them, bringing black humour to a situation that it was becoming increasingly apparent was sickeningly grave.

He checked up and down the corridor before letting himself in, locking the door behind him and opening Potter's desk drawer to find the tumbler and three-quarters-full bottle of firewhiskey that he knew was stored there.

Draco opened the bottle and poured himself a generous amount, swallowing quickly and screwing his eyes shut as the flames licked down his throat.

 _A hand in his hair, stroking gently. His mother hadn't done this since he was very small and he found himself pressing his head up into her touch, more comforted than he could believe, almost able to forget the sound of Granger's screams, the lingering ache of the Dark Lord's furious punishment in his muscles._

 _The fingers in his hair twisted, yanking sharply on the fine strands and Draco's eyes flew open to meet his aunt's hollow grey gaze. "You must cut out your heart, nephew," she hissed. Her breath was a rotten wash over his face. "It makes you weak, and there is no room for weakness in the service of Our Lord."_

Draco opened his eyes, tried to focus on the way the lamplight winked on the firewhiskey.

 _Blink_.

The fall of light on Granger's face, the soft skin stretching taut across her jaw when she had smiled at Theo. Draco had felt a pull at the edge of his mouth; an instinctive need to reflect the expression back at her, to show her what it meant.

He gulped back the contents of his tumbler, relishing the burn of the whiskey as he sloshed more into the glass.

 _Blink_.

He'd always known that she was pretty - it was just another thing to find infuriating about her.

 _Blink. Gulp. Pour._

The war had pared the girlishness from her, leaving a stark, insistent beauty in its wake. He had seen it; even as her face had twisted into a scream under Aunt Bella's knife he had seen it; but he had forced himself to forget.

 _Cut out your heart._

 _Swallow the burn; pour another._

He had watched the way that she and Theo moved around one another, uncertain as to what had given him pause, until he heard the laugh in her voice as she said Theo's name. Had seen the way Theo looked down at her, bright and warm and wondering.

 _Blink_. The bottle was half-empty but his head was still full.

Theo, watchful Theo. But Theo had always seen her, hadn't he. Draco remembered making a snide comment about Granger in Potions when they were what - sixteen? And Theo had laughed softly, eyes tracing the curve of the Muggleborn witch's scowl as he murmured, "You're a fucking fool."

The burn in his eyes was from the whiskey, Draco told himself, as he tipped back another two fingers.

Because of course Theo had been right. In this, as in so many things. It wasn't just that Granger was lovely: she was also fierce and clever and short-tempered and sarcastic. She'd let his mother and his Aunt Andromeda teach her to play politics, but the new-found grace had only augmented the tooth and claw of her.

She'd saved him, Draco knew, and she had kept on saving him - humour and kindness and sharpness a balm when being dead; when the enormity of the situation in the Department of Mysteries; when the weight of his guilt had been too much.

 _Blink. Swallow._

But she'd saved Theo too. Theo, who had never stopped seeing her, who held himself walled away behind pain and fear and coldness but who kept on looking nonetheless. Draco had watched them moving around one another in the kitchen, sleep dusted, eyes light when they met. And he had known that watching was all he could do, because it was too late, too late, and he was a fool as he had always been.

The last of the whiskey sloshed in the bottom of the bottle, and Draco abandoned the glass to raise the neck of it to his lips. Before he could tip his head back however another hand had closed upon the bottle and forced it back down to the desk.

"What on earth are you doing?"

Potter's voice, Potter's hand on his shoulder, and Draco leaned forward to rest his elbows on the desk, rubbing his hands over his face.

"Malfoy?" Potter had slid around the desk, fitting himself into the narrow space.

Draco looked up at him, squinted, tried to fuse the swimming vision of two ragged, black-haired wizards into one coherent being. "Potter," he heard himself saying, "have you ever had to consider the notion that you may be fundamentally unlovable?"

It sounded ridiculous when he spoke the thought aloud, and Draco laughed scornfully into his own palm. "No," he said, almost to himself, "No of course you haven't, you're Harry _fucking_ Potter."

"I don't...you're not unlovable, Malfoy," Potter said slowly. "Look at your mum. Defied Voldemort for you. Lied to his face."

"My mother has to love me Potter," Draco scoffed, grabbing the bottle back and finally downing the last of it. "That's how being a mother works, don't you know anything?"

"That's all I really know about my mother." Potter's voice was very quiet. "That she loved me. That she died for it."

"Fuck," Draco swore, feeling, as he would not have thought possible a moment before, even worse. "I didn't even...that was terribly insensitive of me Potter I -"

"I'm willing to let the whiskey take the blame for it." The two Potters wobbled momentarily before him then resolved themselves into one, who smiled ruefully and plucked the empty bottle from Draco's grasp. "It's rather early in the day to be trying to give yourself alcohol poisoning. What the hell's going on?"

"Fucking Granger," Draco muttered, scowling at the bottle when Potter set it back down on the table. He felt the terrible, threatening burn of tears and wished that he still had some whiskey left that he could use as an excuse if they did manage to fall. When he looked up Potter was watching him, his face unreadable.

"Hermione?" he murmured. "What did _Hermione_ do?"

"Nothing," Draco groaned, "She didn't do _anything_."

"Okay…" Potter drew the word out, obviously waiting for him to go on.

"It's my own fault," Draco muttered. "But of course he's far better for her." He looked up, gave Potter a wry twist of a smile. "Still the epic-levels of self-loathing, naturally, but without the side of rampant narcissism."

Potter frowned slightly. "You mean Nott?" he said slowly, "Nott and Hermione?"

Draco felt the urge to laugh, or maybe vomit, and he pushed himself upright, lurching slightly towards Potter in the cramped space.

" _Theodore_ and _Granger_ ," he corrected. "Off to see Thoros Nott to continue playing at happy fucking domestic family bliss." His head was somehow lolling on Potter's shoulder, which was damp with tears he hadn't realised he was shedding.

"I didn't see it," Draco whispered, hearing the crack in his own voice and deciding not to care. "But it doesn't matter anyway, because I am fundamentally unlovable."

"You're not," Potter sighed, a hot huff of air on the nape of Draco's neck.

He turned his face into the angle of Potter's jaw, not really thinking as he mumbled, lips moving over at least a day's worth of stubble. "I am though, bitter and mean and irredeemable and un-"

Potter turned his head slightly so that his mouth cut Draco off, soft-lipped and gentle then pulling away. "Shut the fuck up, Malfoy, and stop being an arse."

He stepped back, putting as much distance between them as the tiny office would allow, hands firm on Draco's shoulders, green eyes holding grey with an unwavering stare. "I'm not going to help you throw a pity party," Potter said. "And I'm not going to provide you with a distraction just because we're both miserable. You either mean it or you don't bother."

Draco swayed against the other man's grip. Had he just kissed him? He thought that he had, but then his head was a mess of firewhiskey and the look on Granger's face when she had smiled at Theo that morning and the clean scent of Potter's robes and -

Potter gave another sigh. "Let's get you home, shall we?"

 **OOOOO**

Azkaban was a horror even without the Dementors, Hermione thought to herself. She could feel tension radiating out of Theo, his nervousness and anger making the air of the small visitors' room difficult to breathe.

She snuck a look at him, noted how his eyes were pressed tightly shut, jaw clenched and hand tapping a rhythm on the arm of his chair.

 _Of course. You fucking fool._

Hermione sighed and stared at her own hands, twisted in her lap.

 _"You're serious," he'd said, incredulity in his hazel eyes. His fingers around her wrist were nearly tight enough to hurt, the two of them stood so close that she could see every fragment of colour in his gaze. "You actually think it might help us to go and see my fucking maniac of a father?"_

 _Hermione felt it again, that frustrated anger, and she pulled her hand free to jab a finger into his chest. "I don't see any other option, do you?"_

 _Theo laughed, cold and cruel. "There's the option where we don't go and visit convicted murderers."_

 _"And that's the option where we don't find out what we need to and everything goes to hell in a fucking handbasket!" She was really shouting at him now, gesturing wildly, and she knew that her hair would be a mess, that her face was likely splotchy, and she didn't care, because she couldn't just tell him to, she couldn't -_

 _"A handbasket," Theo said softly, mouth a mocking twist. "How very Muggle." It was a calculated hit but the hurt was real nonetheless and Hermione absorbed it, pressing her lips into a line. Theo stared at her for a moment, and she saw the twist of regret in his gaze before he caught her gently by the shoulders, his tone soft and urgent. "You have no idea, Hermione," (and the sound of her name in his mouth was like nothing, nothing before it) "No idea what he would do to you if he could - if he thought that I had ever so much as looked twice at you -"_

 _"Have you, though?" she asked, knowing the answer but wanting, needing to hear him say it, to look into his eyes and know that it was true and not the by-product of the bloody Vow. "Ever so much as looked twice at me?"_

 _"For fuck's sake." His eyes sparked, glittered, held hers. "I can barely look away."_

 _She looked at his mouth, then: wide and full-lipped and set with determination._

 _Tell me to break, he'd said. Tell me to break and I will._

 _She wouldn't; she couldn't._

 _Hermione swallowed. "The Vow -" she whispered, and Theo dropped his hands from her shoulders, stepped back and pushed his fingers through his hair._

 _"Unbelievable," he murmured, then gave a humourless little laugh. "I'm going to go and transfigure myself some fucking robes," he said, turning away from her. "If I turn up wearing denim the old man will likely have a heart attack before you get your precious answers."_

The door swung open and Hermione looked up as two burly guards hauled Thoros Nott into the room between them, setting him in the chair across the table from her and Theo. A tap of a wand, and chains snaked their way around the man's arms, holding him in place.

Theo had gone perfectly, rigidly still the moment his father entered the room, staring at the old man, at the chains. Thoros sat hunched forward in his chair, small and shrunken, though Hermione could see that the man would have had Theo's height when he was younger.

She opened her mouth to speak, but Theo beat her to it. "Father," he said quietly, voice low and quiet and full of emotion.

Slowly, the old man lifted his head, looking at his son with eyes the colour of pale glass, a blue so cold that Hermione felt goosebumps rise down her arms.

"Theodore," he said, voice a lazy drawl. "You're alive."

There was almost no intonation to the words - as though Theo's father truly didn't care about the fact of his son's continued existence.

"I am," Theo replied evenly, and if Hermione hadn't been able to feel him nearly vibrating with anger next to her she would have believed the boredom in his voice as he went on. "Glad to see you're keeping well."

"Not as well as some," his father said, and Hermione watched those pale eyes drift over Theo's face, lingering on the plain robes that he had transfigured from her father's wardrobe. "You could pretend to have a little pride," Thoros sneered disdainfully.

"Pride, Father?" Disbelief. "In what? Your grand heritage of murder and bigotry?"

Thoros's sneer deepened. "Foolish boy," he spat, "Just like your mother, no sense of what it means to have our blood, to be -"

"Enough," Theo said flatly. "Tell me how to find Nott Manor, so I can leave you here to rot."

"The Manor?" Thoros narrowed his eyes, "Why?"

"So I can raze it to the ground? Why do you care?" Hermione could hear Theo's patience withering by the moment, and laid her fingers gently on his arm. The movement caught Thoros's attention and he turned his eyes to her for the first time. His face went blank with shock.

" _You_ ," he breathed, poison and malice and disbelief, and she felt the blood rising to her cheeks even as she met his gaze with a defiant tip to her chin. It hadn't occurred to her that he would know who she was.

 _You have no idea._

"Me," she said, glad that her voice emerged evenly from her mouth. "We need your notes on the Department of Mysteries. I assume that they are stored at Nott Manor?"

Thoros continued to stare at her, and then impossibly, absurdly, he started to laugh.

It was a horrible choking rattle of a sound, and Hermione had to fight the way her nose wrinkled with disgust as drops of spittle landed on the tabletop.

"Of course," he gasped finally, "Of course you would. And of course -" His ice-chip eyes flicked between the pair of them. "Yes," he murmured after a moment. "I see it now." Thoros leaned forwards in his chair, staring at Theo, though Hermione had the strangest sensation that the old man's attention was still more on her. " _Sanguinem invenitur_ ," he whispered. "A drop of blood on your wand and you'll be able to apparate there. Yours will work, no matter how much you've debased it."

Hermione chanced a look at Theo, saw him frowning in confusion. "That's it? You're just going to tell me?"

Thoros gave his horrible laugh again. "It ends here, for me," he said. "I see it now. This is the beginning, but it's where it ends for me." He looked at Hermione, smiled horribly. "I hope you find what you're looking for."

Something in his gaze cut to the core of her, and Hermione found herself shuddering violently even as she cast a quick Patronus to signal to the guards to return. As they hefted Thoros from his seat he looked at his son once more. "A mind of winter, Theodore," the old man hissed. "Do not forget what you are."

Theo stood quickly. "I am alive, and I'm free," he growled. _Almost free_ , Hermione thought with a pang as he went on, "And you are nothing."

His father just continued to laugh softly as the guards dragged him from the room.

"Let's go," Hermione said, closing her hand around Theo's and pulling him behind her as she made her way towards the exit, stopping only briefly to be signed out by the bored clerk, before she reached the apparition point.

"Ready?" she asked, and Theo looked down at her with a sharp nod.

She apparated them to the doorstep, pushing past the door, past the wards, and into the hallway, where she turned back towards him, mouth open to apologise, and found him right there, _right there behind her_.

And then he had one hand in her hair and one on her waist and he was kissing her; kissing and kissing her; like drowning, like desperation, like fear and relief and joy. Like warmth and sunshine and shivering cold.

Like bending and breaking.

And the feel of him: hard planes of wiry muscle and his insistent mouth and his soft hair when she smoothed her hand up the back of his neck and felt him sigh against her.

She had no idea how long it was before he pushed her gently away, before he leaned his forehead to hers, eyes closed, and whispered, "Don't ever ask me to do that again."

* * *

 _ **A/N:** I'm sorry about the failure to update - have a long and meandering chapter full of DEVELOPMENTS by way of apology! Seriously though thank you so much for reading and for all your reviews omg you're so lovely all of you I don't even have words. This chapter goes out to new readers - apparently quite a few of you have binged this in the last couple of weeks, so thank you! Lots of love and I promise not to leave you hanging so long before the next chapter._


	15. Chapter 15

**15: Take**

* * *

The scent of Azkaban had been that of Theo's nightmares – cold stone, blood and dirt. The scent of never being clean again, of never being _free_ again, and so he had not been able to help himself when Hermione turned to him, when her glorious cascade of hair swayed in the breeze of her movement, smelling of nothing so much as _life_.

And so he had kissed her. Had caught her and held her just as he had dreamed, just as he had longed to, and her hands on his arms were a tight grip, the sigh of her breath as she opened her mouth to him was an intoxicating collision of senses – sound and taste together and _how how how had he not before this?_

 _Tell me to break and I will_ , he had told her, but she hadn't. She – stubborn, intractable, _obstinate_ – had refused to tell him, refused to command him and here, suddenly, with his lips against hers and the sweet-sharp tug of her fingers in his hair; here he felt a singularly terrifying sense of completeness.

Safety had a smell, like roses after rain; had a taste, warm and rich. Had hands that flexed and held him and a body that was soft and pliant against his and a heart that beat, beat, beat as his own did, giddy with exhilaration, with the impossibility of being here, being now, being _this_ , with _her_.

 _I'm free_ , he had told his father. _And you are nothing_.

"Don't ever ask me to do that again," he whispered, pulling back, leaning his forehead against hers. He kept his eyes closed as he felt Hermione's gentle fingers graze along the line of his jaw; felt the way that they caught against the light stubble that coated his chin. She skated her hands down either side of his neck, bringing them to rest on his chest.

Unbidden, his father's voice rose to his mind. _Do not forget what you are._

 _No._

Theo blinked his eyes open to meet Hermione's warm gaze. She didn't look away, though he could see the worry in the way her brows pinched together slightly, feel it in the lightness of her palms against his chest.

"Theo," she said, and her voice was quiet, but steady. "Theo, I don't want you to feel that you are obligated, or that you, that you _owe_ me something –"

He felt a chill run across his skin. "Is that what you think this is?"

She shook her head, wordlessly, then - "I don't know, Theo, I don't _know_ what I think this is, and it scares me not to know because I'm the one who has the answers, I'm the one who – who –"

"Who what, Granger?" he bit out, grasping her tightly by the shoulders, seeing her flinch as he reverted to calling her by her last name. "You're the one who _what?_ "

"Who solves the puzzle," she said softly, and Theo laughed, harsh and mocking and full of the echo of his father.

 _Do not forget what you are_.

"So I'm just another puzzle for you to solve, am I?" He felt bitterness creep its way across his tongue, erasing the memory of her taste.

"No, Theo, that isn't what I –"

"What then, _Granger_?"

She flushed, her eyes narrowing with anger as she spat "Don't call me that!"

Theo opened his mouth to reply that he'd call her what he liked and then felt his jaw lock, tongue stilling and the Vow flaming to life around his forearm. Hermione's face went slack with horror as she realized what she had done, and she lifted her hands from his chest to cover her mouth, stumbling backwards from him.

He could see the corresponding shimmer of the Vow twined about the delicate bones of her wrist, and Theo started to laugh again, helpless and mirthless and disbelieving.

"Oh _Hermione_ ," he choked out eventually, "Did you forget something?"

"I'm sorry!" The words were a whisper, urgent and raw, and she half-reached for him with one hand, pausing with it outstretched as though he might shy away.

He considered it, for a moment. _A mind of winter_.

 _Do not forget what you are_.

His hands twitched, remembering the shape of her, the feel of her warmth, how she had seemed to melt into his touch.

 _I am alive, and I'm free_.

She was frozen: a question unasked, a demand unvoiced. Theo's hand lifted to her cheek, his thumb smoothing away the tear that dropped onto it as she closed her eyes, sagging with relief. When he tipped her chin up with his other hand she curled her fingers gently around his elbow.

"I'd rather we didn't," she said. "Not like this, not while I might –"

Everything in him was screaming to disregard the words, to pull her to him, to _demand_ and to _take_ and to _have_ ; and he knew that if he ignored her, at that moment, she would have let him.

 _I don't want you to feel that you are obligated, that you_ owe _me something_.

It was people like Voldemort, like his father, who took and took until there was nothing left, and Theo would not, he _could not_ , so he simply nodded, simply let his hands fall from her face to hang at his sides, emptier than they had ever been.

He watched her take a breath, watched her draw her air of composure back over herself like a cloak. "Nott Manor," she said eventually. "We need to look up the _Sanguinem Invenitur_ ritual before we do anything else."

"We need to be careful," Theo said, marvelling at how normal his voice sounded. "My father – it was too easy."

Hermione nodded. "Agreed. No offence, but I don't think I trust your father as far as I could throw him."

Theo chuckled softly, "Believe me, I'm hardly offended." He eyed her, "Now that we know what we're looking for I think we should try the library at Grimmauld Place again."

Her lips pursed, and he forced the memory of their softness from his mind.

 _Better or worse, to have had a taste?_

He realized that he was staring at her, that she was blushing, a tantalising wash of colour across her golden skin.

Theo swallowed, forced himself to turn away from her and made a sort of shooing gesture. "Shall we go, then?"

"Yes," Hermione nodded after a moment's pause, and she moved past him in the narrow hallway, filling his nose with her scent. His hand half-lifted as though to reach for her: an almost-rebellion.

 _Do not forget what you are_.

 _I am a Nott_ , he thought to himself as she looked over her shoulder, as she jerked her head at him to hurry up. _I am ice and winter and strength and sorrow._

The edge of her mouth lifted quizzically at him.

 _Hers_ , he thought helplessly. _I'm hers._

 **OOOOO**

"Hello?" Hermione called softly up the stairs once she had let them in to Grimmauld Place, mindful of Walburga's sleeping portrait.

"Here!" Harry's voice was equally quiet, carrying just below the volume that they had learned would bring sharp-tongued fury crashing down on their heads.

She followed his call to the kitchen, aware with every step of Theo behind her like a tall, silent shadow.

It was as though his hands had left ghostly impressions of themselves upon her skin: she could still feel the tug of his fingers in her hair, still taste the mint-flavour of the tooth-cleaning charm that he had used that morning at the tip of her tongue. Belatedly she wondered whether he _had_ left a mark, whether she was about to walk into the kitchen wearing the evidence of Theo's mouth on her, and she faltered with her hand on the doorhandle, causing him to stumble into her.

He didn't move back. One of his hands swept the hair gently from the side of her neck, and she felt his breath on her ear.

"You know," he murmured, "You're not really being fair."

 _I'd rather we didn't_. What a ridiculous lie, when the way that he had kissed her had forced everything else from her mind, had made the clamour of her thoughts fall silent but for a single, insistent word.

 _More_.

 _It was just a kiss_ , she tried telling herself, as she fought not to let her head fall back against his shoulder.

 _Liar_.

'Just a kiss' had been the giddy crash of her lips against Ron's during the Battle – carried away with the moment, with loving one another in entirely the wrong way. Silly and over as soon as it had begun.

Theo was not 'just' anything, and she could feel it in the way goosebumps raised themselves across her skin at the mere suggestion of his touch. Desire had flared to life in her when he had kissed her, and if she had thought that she had known what it was to want him before, when he had curled his warmth around her in the night, she'd been wrong.

She had been so very wrong, and now she didn't have the answers, and she saw again the shock in his eyes when she had bitten the words out – _don't call me that_ – heard the way that he had laughed around the gagging effect of the Vow.

 _Not like this_ , she told herself again, and opened the door, stepping away from Theo's mouth, from the embrace of his body around hers.

Harry and Draco were sat at the kitchen table, mugs of coffee between them. Draco looked ashen, sickly, and Hermione wrinkled her nose at the unmistakeable markers of _hangover_ written all over him.

Her eyes went to the clock on the opposite wall. Four in the afternoon, and she opened her mouth, but it was Theo's voice that spoke from behind her.

"A little early for that, isn't it?"

Draco shot him a glare and then winced, bringing one hand to his temple. Harry sat back from the table, crossing his arms and snickering.

"Malfoy decided to take on a bottle of Ogden's, and came off the worst in the fight."

"Is that what you wanted this morning?" Hermione asked, her nose wrinkling. "Someone to go on a bender with?"

"No," Draco growled eventually, "I wanted to ask you what sort of fucking _fool's errand_ you thought you were running, going to see Thoros Nott."

Their bodies weren't touching but Hermione knew that Theo had gone still, watchful and wary at her back.

"We knew that we would have to, eventually," she said. "He was the only one that could tell us how to find Nott Manor, how to –"

"Spare me the fucking lecture, Granger." Harry narrowed his eyes as Draco snapped at her.

 _Don't call me that,_ she heard herself say.

 _Oh Hermione, did you forget something?_ He was nothing like his father, but for a moment she had seen the old man's ghost in the way light and shadow chased themselves across Theo's face, seen Thoros in the twist of his son's mouth.

Draco was looking at Theo, pointedly ignoring her and Harry. "Are you alright?"

Theo stepped around her, careful not to touch. She didn't miss the way that both Harry and Draco tracked the movement before Theo slid into the seat next to Draco, jostling him slightly with his shoulder and causing the blond wizard to wince.

"Fine," he said. "Hermione's right, we would have had to go at some point." He rubbed at a mark on the wooden tabletop. "We had a delightful family reunion, my father reminded me of just how much of an arse he is, and now we need to look up an ancient blood ritual in order to find the Manor."

Harry blinked, "He told you?" He looked at Draco again, and Hermione watched their eyes hold just a moment too long.

Theo shrugged smoothly. "I'm sure receiving news that I have once again proven myself a disappointment by getting myself killed accidentally triggering the Manor wards would be a welcome break in the monotony of his imprisonment." His hazel eyes followed Hermione as she sat down next to Harry, and she felt her skin grow warm beneath his appraisal even as his words brought back the memory of his father's sneer. _Foolish boy._

She had half-reached for his hand before she remembered that they weren't alone, and disguised the gesture by pulling Harry's coffee mug towards her. "He was rather too…forthcoming…for my liking," she said, taking a slurp, wrinkling her nose at the amount of sugar that he had dumped into the black liquid. When she looked up both Theo and Draco were watching her, and she blushed properly. "What?"

Draco sneered and looked away, but Theo didn't move, eyes dark upon her.

"Well," Harry shifted next to her, and she broke Theo's stare, ignoring the race of her heart, stamping on the memory of his mouth on hers. "How long do you think before you can find it?"

Hermione frowned, glad of the question, the distraction of thinking. "We need to confirm how the _Sanguinem Invenitur_ works, and then I think we need to make sure we've prepared sufficiently for anything…unpleasant…that might be waiting at the Manor."

"Well I'm sure you'll be prepared for anything, as usual." Draco said, scowling at her. "After all, you're just _full_ of bright ideas aren't you _Granger_?"

Hermione was opening her mouth to ask whether he might consider dropping the attitude for one moment, but again Theo's quiet voice spoke first, "Stop it." Unseen beneath the table, his leg moved to press against hers.

Draco sighed, massaging his temples. "Sorry. Bit of a day." When he raised his eyes to look at her Hermione was alarmed by the sadness in them. Sadness that was quickly shuttered away behind the signature Malfoy smirk.

Next to her Harry shifted in his seat, "How much of a dick are you planning to be today?"

"Oh Potter," Draco drawled, "You know I don't like to plan my moments of dickery. So much more interesting if things just happen."

Harry gave a snort, and Hermione looked between the two of them, uncertain of what was going on. When her eyes met Theo's he made a tiny shrug, then raised one eyebrow in question.

"Well I guess we'll be off the to library then," she said, pushing herself upright, trying not to watch the fluid lines of Theo's movements as he copied her.

"Just like school," Harry grinned, "How comforting."

It was Hermione's turn to snort. "I'm glad you think so."

* * *

 _ **A/N:** Thank you for being so patient with me! Real life is a bit mental right now and I am not getting as much chance to write as I would wish, but knowing that I have such lovely readers keeps me going! Your reviews are simply wonderful, and thanks especially to **Heeley** who gave me my first ever 500th review this week. Exciting times!_


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16: Need**

* * *

Over the next few weeks Hermione's house seemed to grow walls within its walls; invisible lines that unfurled around chairs and in doorways, demarcating the spaces that the two of them could occupy without their edges overlapping.

Theo watched as Hermione built herself little fortresses of books and parchment, placing them along ephemeral boundaries that could have been crossed in a heartbeat, in a single stretch of his long legs. He ignored the jump of his pulse every time she moved, kept his feet planted on the floor. But he watched her nonetheless.

And although she had become adept at avoiding his gaze, Theo knew that she watched him too. He could feel the weight of her eyes as he sat, head bowed over some book or another, or as they walked side by side, never touching, through the streets of Muggle London. Hermione seemed to sense the restless energy building in him during the long periods of reading and note-taking, and so she began taking ever longer routes, opening up areas of the city that he hadn't even known existed, the excursions proving not so much distraction as revelation.

For a wizard whose sense of geography was patchy at best (limited for the most part to about a mile's radius around a floo outlet or chosen apparition point) learning the shape of a city by foot was an intriguing undertaking, and Theo had to admire Hermione's tactics.

What stunned him more than anything was the sheer _scale_ of Muggle London. Theo was used to populations that numbered in the tens of thousands - and Magical Britain had taken such a battering over the last thirty years that it was barely that. That one city could be home to many millions of people was staggering, impossible, and yet he saw the truth of it in the grandeur of the buildings, in the wildly populous streets, museums, shops and restaurants.

"Why are we here?" he asked her one afternoon, as they sat in a small cafe and he sipped tentatively at a drink that seemed to be more foam than liquid but was, apparently, coffee.

"So that you understand what's at stake," she whispered, looking at her hands where they were wrapped around her own cardboard - _cardboard_ , because apparently Muggles eschewed proper crockery - cup. Theo's fingers twitched with the desire to press his hands over hers, to warm her with his own heat as well as that of the drink, but there was a space between them now that it seemed could not be bridged by smiles or conversation or friendly camaraderie.

It needed the press of lips, of skin against skin, but it was a distance that was measured in those three words - _not like this_ \- and he was determined not to reach across it; to respect the sliver of choice that she had given him.

He pulled his thoughts back to the matter at hand. "And what is at stake?" he asked her, and she finally raised her glowing brown eyes to his, making his heart leap and his breath catch.

Her gaze flicked away, surveying the busy cafe before she answered. "If things are as bad as we think, if the fundaments of magic are in some way damaged, then it isn't just our world that will suffer for it..."

She trailed off, and Theo said nothing for a long moment, let her turn her eyes back to him. "And yet the Ministry does nothing," he murmured.

Hermione nodded slightly, "The Ministry does nothing."

* * *

Theo mulled her words as he lay, sleepless, in his bed that night. By unspoken agreement they had not shared a bed since the day they had visited his father -

 _not like this not like this not like this_

\- and he felt the yearning for her as he replayed the feeling of her eyes on his. It had been weeks, but he still remembered the way that they fit together, still remembered the taste of her mouth, felt it as a sharp yank across the thread of his being, as though the fabric of what he was would unravel under her gaze and be remade, becoming - what?

Someone who could sleep in a bed, and not on the floor?

Someone who was more than blood, more than a name, more than an inheritance?

Someone raised with coldness, but who could taste change upon the air and had learned, finally, what it was to _want_ -

Pulling the duvet higher around his shoulders, Theo burrowed into the warm that was still cold with the absence of her, and he was unsure whether it was a dream or simply his fevered imagination that saw the shape of her shoulder in the moonlight, the vulnerable beauty of her neck when she lay on her side.

* * *

He sat in the library at Grimmauld Place the next morning, reading about all the different ways in which old blood wardings could be keyed to dismember unwary intruders, and all he could think of was the colour of her blush, the scent of her hair when she dragged her fingers through it.

"When do you think you'll be ready?" Draco asked, appearing on the other side of the green leather-topped reading table. Hermione had disappeared off to the Ministry with Potter in order to protest some idiotic new Ministry ruling about the inheritance rights of children of Death Eaters, and Andromeda had taken Narcissa shopping, leaving Theo, wandless, to watch Teddy.

He cut his gaze to where the toddler sat, playing with blocks that glittered and spun in a patch of sunlight that had the post-rain clarity that seemed peculiar to April. Teddy's hair was phasing lazily from turquoise to a fresh, spring green, through a familiar chestnut, and then into silver as he shot a gummy smile towards the sound of Draco's voice.

Draco smiled back, looking suddenly much younger than eighteen, and Theo felt his shoulders slump, dropping his face into his hands with a sigh.

It had taken a long time, even with the formidable combination of his and Hermione's researching abilities, for them to find the origins of the _Sanguinem Invenitur_ , and then weeks after that to read up on all the possible hexes and jinxes that might lie waiting for them at Nott Manor. In theory, Theo's blood should have been enough to grant them passage through the wards, but every time he tried to reassure himself he would hear his father's laugh again; see the cruel light dancing in his eyes; and one look at Hermione's face would tell him that she was having the same reservations.

But the readings coming back from the Department of Mysteries showed more magic leaking out every day, and they couldn't afford to wait.

"I think we're as ready as we're likely to be," he said now, letting the implications of the words lie on the air, wondering whether Draco would push him any further.

The pale wizard frowned, and Theo noted the way that it chased the youthfulness from his face, the pinch between Draco's brows growing more pronounced than ever as his features darkened.

"So why haven't you gone yet?" Draco asked finally, eyes skimming over the copy of _Stirpis Maga_ whose marginalia Theo was poring through and then finally coming to rest on Theo's.

"Hermione's...nervous," he said eventually, watching the shadow of something flicker through Draco's eyes at the mention of her name.

He hadn't missed the fact that Draco was avoiding Hermione - the way his pale eyes skipped over her and he addressed questions to the room at large when really they were for her to answer. _What_ , Theo wondered to himself, _is that about?_

"Granger worries too much," Draco growled. "If you're going to stage a home invasion at your own Manor, you should just bloody get on with it."

Theo bit back the arch reply about _forewarned is forearmed_ that jumped to his tongue, chewing his cheek and smoothing his face into blankness. _Be patient_ , he told himself, _be patient._ He had waited Draco out before. He could do it again.

 _A mind of winter_.

"What is it with her?" Draco asked finally, quietly, and Theo blinked as the conversation took a turn that he hadn't been expecting.

"What do you mean?" he asked carefully, thinking about the quirk of her smile and the clear, quiet, chime of her voice. _Everything_ , he wanted to say. _It's_ everything _with her_.

Draco was scowling at the book again, as though it might be singularly responsible for whatever iteration of bad mood he had woken up in that day. "Why does she have to be so bloody...so bloody _righteous_ , the whole time?"

When he looked up again there was something almost helpless about his expression, and Theo held onto the laugh that threatened because really, he couldn't have put it better himself, except that she wasn't always right, was she? Because _not like this_ seemed to mean _not like anything_ and the longing, the _need_ , was slowly building up inside him, to the point where he was in danger, now, of drowning in it every time he caught the faintest hint of her rain-and-roses scent.

"Gryffindors," he said instead, and was relieved to see a hint of the old smirk brush itself around the corners of Draco's mouth. "Self-righteous and pigheaded and infuriating."

 _Wonderful and blazing and bright as the sun._ And it was true that everything else seemed a little paled and inconsequential in the absence of her brilliance.

 _Nothing is so beautiful -,_ breathed his mother.

 _A mind of winter,_ his father growled.

Theo jumped, and looked down at the inkblot where his quill had unwittingly stabbed the page. Draco raised a silvery eyebrow. "But now she's dragging her heels," he said slowly, and Theo sighed, shoulders slumping.

"She's afraid," he admitted, thinking of the concern in her eyes, the nervous energy as she tore through books of curses and countercurses. "And I think...I think that she's right to be." He looked up at Draco, "Even if we do manage to find something in my father's research, that brings us one step closer to doing something about the Department of Mysteries, and fuck knows how badly that might go."

A long moment, Draco's lips slowly pursing, and then - "You're still here by choice. She isn't making you."

Theo felt a frown tugging at him, unsure where Draco was going with this. "She isn't, no."

"I remember what it was like," Draco said very quietly, "Not to have a choice. I think you do too. Even if it all goes to shit now, at least we had the choice."

They held each other's eyes, and Theo nodded slowly. Draco's gaze was steady, unusually patient, and Theo found himself seized by the desire to tell him - _it's her, I choose her_ \- but then a small weight knocked against his legs, and chubby fingers grasped his knee.

Teddy's hair was a wave of chestnut, his smile bright and happy. "Up!" he chirped merrily, and Theo sighed, closing the horrible book and pushing it away before he pulled the toddler into his lap.

"You are spoiled rotten," he told him, but Teddy simply grinned and bounced cheerily on Theo's knee.

"Dwak!" he chirped, reaching across the table to Draco, who affected a ridiculously exaggerated sneer as Teddy began to clamber across the desk, knocking the book to the floor as he went.

"Bloody hell," Theo muttered, bending to retrieve the horrible thing from the dark recesses beneath the table. His fingers found the leather cover, but it slipped in his grip, a page pulling loose as he picked it up.

He barely heard Draco's snort of "language," as he stared at the paper in his hand, and the curling note across it.

 **OOOOO**

"Miss Granger, you seem to think yourself above wizarding law, but I can assure you that that is not the case." Doge frowned at her over the top of his spectacles, his wild tufts of hair appearing to quiver with indignation.

"It isn't law yet," Hermione replied, moving her furious gaze from stony face to stony face. "It's a piece of proposed legislation, and it's blatantly punitive of innocent parties."

She gestured to the defence gallery, where Hestia and Flora Carrow, Ffion Wilkes, Perdita Macnair and Benedict Yaxley were sat with Harry, all looking pale and scared. From somewhere in the ranks of Wizengamot there came a stifled snort, and Hermione shifted her glare in its direction.

"You will leave these children destitute," she said quietly. "You will leave them with nothing but the clothes on their backs if this law is passed, and they have done _nothing_ wrong -"

"Just like Theodore Nott did nothing wrong?" Hermione didn't see who spoke, but she felt the mood of the room shift, focus turning away from her and towards the upper tier of the Wizengamot, where a tall, thin woman had risen to her feet, raising a shaking finger to point towards the floor of the cavernous room. "You have bought the votes of this chamber once, Hermione Granger, with your name, with the tricks you learned from Albus Dumbledore, but I will not stand by again as you defend the rights of dark witches and wizards over those -"

"Dark?" Hermione repeated quietly, holding the woman's eyes steadily. "These are _children_ , they shouldn't be made to suffer because of what their parents did in the service of Voldemort."

"And so others should suffer in their stead?" The woman's voice had reached a pitch of outrage, and Hermione tried desperately to remember her name, her family; the circumstances that could have given rise to such a strength of feeling.

"Theodore Nott is no child," the woman went on. "And these so-called _children_ are the same age that you were when Albus Dumbledore sent you to kill the Dark Lord, older than Draco Malfoy was when he took the Mark. They are of an age to answer for the crimes of their _noble houses_."

Hermione stood, rigid with fury and shock. "We _were_ children," she said, trying to keep her voice steady. "We were children when we did what we did, because the Ministry did nothing, and so we had no choice. And Draco Malfoy was a child when he took the Mark, and he suffered enough, and now he's dead, but Theo was never -"

"He is Thoros Nott's _son_ , Mark or no Mark," the woman spat. "She," pointing at Perdita, whose already pale face blanched further, "Is Walden Macnair's daughter. Darkness must be punished, and I will have _justice_." The woman shut her mouth with a snap, and Hermione finally remembered who she was.

"Lady Abbott," she said. "I understand that your daughter's death -"

"Her murder, you mean," said a voice from the other side of the room, and a buzz of whispers filled the still air. Hermione could feel her grasp on the situation slipping and cast a quick glance at Harry, who shrugged helplessly.

"Please consider what it is that you are proposing," she said finally. "This is cruel, and unnecessary. There has been enough suffering, and there are other, larger things that we should be thinking about, rather than punishing the dead by way of their children."

But the faces that looked down at her were stony, immovable, and she saw Lady Abbott smile with grim satisfaction as she sat back down in her seat. "Go home to your pet Death Eater," someone yelled from the public gallery, and Hermione couldn't stop the flush that climbed her neck as she kept her head held high and proud.

"You are making a mistake," she said, but her voice was lost in the rising hubbub, and so she turned on her heel, and started to walk from the chamber.

"Miss Granger!" Doge's reedy voice rose above the clamour in the room, and Hermione paused, glaring over her shoulder at him. From the corner of her eye she saw Harry ushering the young Slytherins from the room. "Do not forget, Miss Granger, that we granted your charge leave to visit his father," Doge's rheumy gaze was sharp, almost greedy. "Should you manage to recover Nott Manor, The contents thereof will also be subject to the reparations law."

Hermione bit her cheek, tasting blood but also the bitter flavour of magic gone bad, gone angry and twisted. It was heavy on the air, and Hermione couldn't think how the Wizengamot members hadn't noticed. She held Doge's stare. "I won't forget," she said simply, before she walked out of the doors.

As usual the corridor outside was deserted; no one wished to linger by the courtrooms. Hermione drew her robes tight around herself, shivering in the damp coolness as she headed towards the doors at the far end.

"Granger," called a low voice, and she turned to see Davies emerge from the shadows to one side. Hermione swallowed carefully as she watched him approach her, his face drawn and eyes intent.

"What do you want?" she asked warily. "Nott is under warding at Harry's house, I have his wand here, there's no need for you to -"

"I heard what you called him in there, Granger," Davies said, his face twisting with hatred, and Hermione felt her stomach drop as she remembered. _Theo_ , she'd said. _Theo was never -_

"He's living in my house," she said carefully. "Do you expect me to call him Nott forever, like he isn't even a person, like doesn't deserve -"

"He deserves to rot like his father," Davies had taken another step towards her, and Hermione tried to back away but found her shoulders hitting the wall. Her fingers tightened on the two wands in her pocket as she felt fear settle like a leaden weight in her stomach. _Where was Harry?_

She opened her mouth to retort but then Davies had his hand pressed to her lips, his other wrapping tight around her wrist, too tight for her to maintain her grip on the wands, and her fear became terror at the look in his eyes. "They murdered my mother and sister, you know," Davies whispered, leaning in close to her. "The Death Eaters. Well," he smiled, though it was more of a grimace. "They had their fun with them first, and then they tortured them for a bit, and then they killed my sister in front of my mother and left her to bleed out."

"Roger," Hermione tried to say, but he just pressed his hand tighter against her mouth.

"That's what you're defending," he hissed, and then his eyes moved slowly across her, his sneer becoming more pronounced as he released her, stepping back and pointedly wiping his hand on his robes. "That's what you're taking to your bed."

She couldn't deny it, because even if she hadn't, even if it wasn't true, she couldn't stop the way the feeling of Theo's mouth on hers played through her mind at Davies's words, and some flicker of that must have shown in her face, because the Auror laughed at her expression.

"Look at you, golden girl," he taunted, "You're nothing but a Death Eater whore." His eyes darted towards where the glittering mark of the Vow was just visible in the low light, and he gave another low laugh. "Or a Death Eater's mistress, in any case." Somewhere nearby a door slammed, and Davies turned his head to the sound, before looking back at her quickly. "I guess I'll see you for the next inspection," he said as he turned away, and there was something in his expression that chilled her to her bones.

* * *

 _ **A/N:** This chapter is for **muddierwaters** because I enjoyed reading your reviews so much, I really hope your keyboard isn't broken. Also yeah, Davies is a fucking prick, but a prick with a backstory..._


	17. Chapter 17

_**A/N:** Gosh, hasn't it been a long time? There have been many things afoot, and I'm afraid that my head has been out of this story for quite a while...however, we appear to be back in the game. To recap: Hermione has just lost a court case at the Ministry, and Theo has just found a note in a book in the library at Place. This chapter has come out entirely from Theo's perspective, but I promise we'll be much more in Hermione's head next chapter. Onwards!_

* * *

 **17: Ask**

* * *

"What is that?"

Draco's voice seemed to be coming from a long way away, drowned out by the rushing sound of Theo's blood in his ears as he stared at the piece of paper in his hand, at the curling note across it.

Three different sets of handwriting, the old parchment soft with age and jaggedly torn across the top, so that the first, scribbled line was the second half of a sentence.

 _ **and as you well know that's a completely fallacious argument**_

 _I think you mean Fawlacious_

 _ **Aria you're ridiculous**_

 _No just think about it, it would make sense if you consider the displacement at the site and the fact that you_

 _ **It doesn't make sense, you know it doesn't. You can only travel within a twenty-four hour period and within a set geographical area so**_

 **You're both terribly boring. I'm bored of this. Who are you going to the Yule ball with?**

 _Really?_

 _ **Bella, we're having**_

 **A pointless argument, I know. Rodolphus has asked me, did Rabastan ask you V?**

 _ **I'm not going**_

 **Everyone's going, what are you talking about?**

 _She's making a_

The final line ended in a scrawl, as though the paper had been wrenched away, but Theo couldn't tear his eyes from the delicate shapes of the words: the soft curl of a g; the flick of an apostrophe. His mother's handwriting.

A pale hand appeared between his eyes and the paper, the fingers snapping rudely, and Theo wrenched his eyes slowly from the parchment.

"What," Draco enunciated slowly, "is that?"

"My," Theo's throat felt thick, his face hot. "My mother," he said, "And your aunt Bellatrix."

"I _beg_ your pardon?" Theo watched what little colour Draco had leave his face, relinquishing the parchment without a fight when the other wizard snatched it from his fingers. Draco's eyes skated back and forth across the notes quickly, his frown deepening, before he looked up at Theo, the shock evident across his face. "This looks like it's from when they were at school?"

Theo shrugged helplessly, "It was tucked into the book." His eyes moved across the dark, tooled leather, full of the history of old families and the various dark magics they used to protect themselves, and then returned to Bellatrix's heavy, sharp scrawl. "I didn't know they were friends," he said quietly. "I thought - from what Andromeda and your mother said -"

"They were much closer to Aunt Bella at Hogwarts," Draco said quietly. "Before - before Aunt Andromeda and Ted, before he - Voldemort -"

They both shuddered at the name, and Draco looked back down at the note, seemingly seeking a change of subject. "Who is this, anyway?" he asked, pointing at the third set of handwriting. "Do you remember anyone else called V?"

"No," Theo said slowly, scanning the writing upside down. It was an elegant script, and though the letters were small the ascenders and descenders formed large, expressive loops. It was neither as formal as his mother's nor as haphazard as Bellatrix's, and something about it nagged at him, but before he could follow the wisp of thought Teddy had reached out and grabbed the parchment.

"Hey!" Draco said, closing his own hand around the toddler's and attempting to unclasp his grip. "Not a toy, I'm afraid, little man."

"Merlin," Theo said, dragging a hand through his hair and gazing at the toddler, who was now trying to snatch the parchment back from where Draco held it safely at arm's length above his head. "How much longer before the others are back?"

"No idea," Draco muttered, "Has Her Highness not informed you?"

"Don't," Theo snapped, his frustration at the lack of answers, at the lack of _sense_ , boiling over and finding an outlet in Draco's ridiculous behaviour towards Hermione. "I don't know what your problem is with her, but it needs to stop."

Draco narrowed his eyes, his gaze dropping briefly to Teddy, who was now occupied using Theo's quill to scrawl nonsense on one of the many pieces of spare parchment that littered the desk. "My problem?" he asked quietly.

"You treat her like…" Theo remembered the toddler and bit his tongue, "...like she isn't even _there_ , and given everything that she's done for you -"

"Oh yes," Draco sighed, and there was an edge of cool mockery in his voice that Theo thought had been long-since worn away. "Everything she's done, _wonderful_ Granger with her _brilliant_ schemes, saving me and saving my friends and saving the world all because it's the _right bloody thing to do_ , even though I'm a _fool_ , even though -"

He stopped, drew in a breath, and Theo saw the glassy shimmer in Draco's grey eyes, and realised, suddenly: heard the words from his own mouth, years ago, as he'd watched the fall of light on Hermione's face.

 _You're a fucking fool, Draco._

Theo swallowed, his stomach churning with a feeling that fell into a complex space somewhere in between guilt and possessiveness.

"I -" he started to say, and Draco looked up at him, caught by something in Theo's voice, the new layer of softness.

"Oh, no need for that," he said quietly. "I don't know what it is, exactly, between you two, but I'm not blind." His mouth lifted at one corner but there was no humour in the expression. "Although it took me seeing you together to understand -"

"I'm sorry," Theo blurted, but Draco waved his hand.

"Don't be. I should apologise for being an ar-" He covered Teddy's ears, making the toddler squeak with delight "- an arsehole." Draco moved his shoulders in what seemed to be an approximation of a nonchalant shrug, and he gave another grim smile. "It wasn't - it just occurred to me rather suddenly, seeing the way she was with you and knowing someone like her would never, that I could never be worthy of…"

He trailed off, frowning down at the tabletop, and Theo pushed himself out of the chair, gently removing the parchment from Draco's fingers and lifting Teddy down to the floor before pulling his friend into a tight hug.

"You're worth the effort it takes to love you, Draco," he said quietly. "Take it from someone who would know."

"I just...they didn't save me for _me_ , it was because my mother told them to, I didn't deserve..." Draco said, his voice thick and muffled against Theo's shoulder, and Theo found himself holding Draco tighter, his voice a fierce whisper when he spoke.

"They saved you because you didn't deserve the sentence the Ministry would have passed down. And they kept you around when they could have sent you away. You are not your father, Draco," Theo said, finally breaking the hug, ducking his head slightly to try and look into his friend's eyes.

Draco nodded, but avoided his gaze, giving a delicate sniff. "Look at me," Theo said, hearing the unusual tone of command in his own voice, seeing it in the surprise on Draco's face as their eyes met. "You are not your father," Theo repeated, "Any more than I am mine."

Finally Draco sighed. "You're right," he said, giving a more emphatic nod this time. "I'm sorry, I should - I should probably apologise to Gra- to Hermione," he continued, and Theo half-smiled.

"I'm sure she'd appreciate it." His eyes went back to the scrap of parchment, to the writing that still worried at something at the edge of his thoughts. Before they could take shape, however, the door to the library banged open and Harry stormed in.

"Potter," Draco said, looking faintly alarmed, "We weren't expecting -"

"They fu-" Harry started to say, then caught sight of Teddy, who was beaming at him from the floor, hair turned messy and dark. "-dging passed it," Harry finished lamely, shoving his glasses up his nose with a frustrated growl. Theo felt his heart leap into his throat, folded the parchment into his pocket. It could wait.

"They passed it?" Draco was saying, "In spite of everything Granger did?"

"Lady Abbott," Harry said, placing his balled fists on the desk and leaning over them. "Had some choice words for Hermione, after which the Wizengamot wasn't really in the mood to listen to reasoned argument." When he looked up Theo saw that Harry's colour was high, that his eyes glittered with anger. He was staring at Draco, the two of them seemingly engaged in some sort of wordless conversation.

Theo decided any sort of interrogation about that could wait for later. "What did Lady Abbott say?" he asked in a low voice, and after a moment Harry turned towards him.

"She called for justice," he said quietly. "And she said that the kids are of age to answer for the crimes of their Houses. That you all are."

Theo's heart gave a nervous little jump in his chest, and he tasted blood in his mouth as he bit his cheek. "Where's Hermione?"

 **OOOOO**

"What happened?" Theo asked.

Hermione's hands stilled where she had been chopping vegetables without magic. As she laid the knife down on the counter Theo was seized by a wave of _deja-vu_.

 _The blade against her skin, the mocking challenge in her voice, her eyes huge and dark when she looked up at him_ -

"We lost," she said, seeming to force herself into a mechanical movement, sweeping the slices of carrot from the board and into a pan.

"I know," Theo said, moving to stand at the other side of the kitchen table. _It's like chess_ , he thought.

Two steps forward.

 _As though I were a knight_.

And Hermione like a queen, dancing away, always just further than he could follow.

Defensive.

Impenetrable.

"Fucking good for you," she muttered, banging the pan down on the stovetop, filling it with a muttered " _Aguamenti_ " and then flicking her wand with uncharacteristic violence to conjure an overlarge blue flame underneath it. "Bugger," she groaned, and Theo felt himself frown, let himself take a step to the side; completing his knight's move to stand next to her.

Part of him told him not to push, but another, the part that had been denied for weeks now, didn't care; was too impatient to defer to her mood as he usually would.

Theo thought of the grim resignation that had limned every inch of Potter when he had appeared in the library; the long look that he had shared with Draco. No need for words, and if Hermione would only look at him he knew there would be no need for words between them either - but she would not, and _not like this_ echoed again through his mind again as he held his ground beside her.

"Tell me what happened," Theo said, his voice soft but firm, and he watched as Hermione's shoulders tensed, as her mouth set.

"They wouldn't listen," she breathed, her fingers clenching on the counter, knuckles going white. "They didn't even...they're so _angry_ , and they're taking it out on children, and it's all broken and terrible and then _Roger_ -"

"Davies?" Theo asked, feeling a cold ripple of anger move through him. "What did he do?"

Hermione turned, finally, to face him, and he saw in the determined line of her jaw, the shine of her eyes, that she had decided not to tell him. Which meant that Davies had said or done something that she knew Theo would have a problem with.

The temperature of his anger switched abruptly from cold to furious heat.

"Tell me what he -"

"I remember how it was," Hermione cut him off, grabbing the chopping board and practically flinging it into the sink, placing the knife after it with only marginally more care. "I remember having to defend Harry against everything - against _you_ ," she spat, and Theo winced momentarily in shame, "And it makes me furious having to - hearing them call you - when I know you're not, that you were _never_ -"

"Don't pretend that it's like it was with Potter," Theo said, hating the vehemence of his tone, hating himself for getting sidetracked, but determined, nonetheless, to make her say it, to make her _admit it_. They were worlds away from what had been, from _how_ things had been, and he was tired of her trying to pretend that it wasn't true.

"Like what was with Harry?" Hermione demanded, whirling to glare at him, empty hands falling to her hips.

"How you feel," Theo said quietly, "when they say things about me, when you have to defend -"

"You know it isn't!" she said sharply - too sharply perhaps, because she half-raised a hand towards her mouth, letting it hover in mid-air. And Theo, tired and frightened and frustrated, made the barest movement, closing his fingers around hers, like catching a bird.

"Please," Hermione whispered, though she made no move to extricate her hand. "You know it's different, but you know that I can't, I _won't_ -"

He couldn't deny the relief he felt at her words, and he let it gentle his voice, let it relax, slightly, his grip on her fingers. "Tell me what Davies said," Theo asked softly, and then, when she bit her lip, eyes glistening, he released her hand and cupped her face. "Please tell me," Theo whispered, holding her gaze until he saw her relent.

"He called me a whore," Hermione breathed. "A Death Eater's whore." She blinked her eyes closed, and a tear started down her cheek. Theo's free hand had clenched by his side, and he struggled for a moment to control the rising tide of rage that threatened to crash over him.

"And that's what you think you would be?" he asked her, and Hermione's eyes flew open, showing him the reflection of his own anger.

"No," she bit out, her fingers rising to close around his wrist where he still touched her face. "Because quite aside from anything else that _isn't_ what you are. But I would be worse, wouldn't I? I would be taking advantage of you in the worst _possible_ way and I won't - I couldn't -"

She stopped talking when Theo sighed and leaned his forehead against hers, catching a fresh tear with the pad of his thumb. For a long moment they were silent together, the kitchen filled only with the whisper of flame, of breath, and then -

"Do you know what the Imperius Curse feels like?" Theo asked, and Hermione nodded, her eyes closed. "Well so do I," he murmured, turning his head slightly to press a kiss to her temple. "I know what compulsion is," he went on, "and I've felt it from the Vow, and this -" another kiss, this time at the edge of her brow "- if there _is_ a compulsion here it is nothing to do with a spell, or a Vow, or anything but you."

"I -" Hermione started to say, but Theo wasn't done.

"You wore your hair in a braid to Potions throughout most of our Sixth Year," he said, and Hermione went still. "There would always be a curl that escaped, just," he moved his fingers to stroke the side of her forehead, "here."

"What -"

"Shh," he breathed. "You started using turquoise ink after Christmas that year. I don't know who bought it for you but it would stain your knuckles, sometimes your mouth."

"Ginny got it for me," she said softly, and Theo nodded, letting his lips graze her cheek.

"You always sat in the same nook in the Library. By the south-west windows, where you'd get the most light."

Hermione remained still as a statue in his arms, staring at him with eyes full of questions. "I watched you," he said simply. "You were...out of the question, and yet I couldn't help myself."

"Out of the question," she echoed, and her fingers raised to trace the shape of his mouth.

"I watched you because you compelled me," he said. "You still do. It has nothing to do with the Vow."

"I'm afraid," Hermione murmured, her breath warm on his skin. "There's so much that we don't know, so many answers we don't have, and how can I claim the moral high ground, persuade them that I'm right, if I - if they -"

"If they think you're a Death Eater whore," Theo whispered, the words tasting like ashes in his mouth.

"I want it to be _over_ ," Hermione said, her hands fisting in his robes as she dropped her head forwards, leaning against him, and Theo didn't hesitate in wrapping his arms around her.

"Then we stop delaying, and go to Nott Manor," he said, with a calm certainty that he was far from feeling. "We'll go tomorrow. We'll find some answers."

Against him Hermione nodded, exhaustion having bled the fight from her.

Theo's stomach twisted uncomfortably at the prospect of finally casting the _Sanguinem Invenitur_ , of finding what lay in wait for them at his childhood home. Answers perhaps.

 _Or,_ he thought, his mind going to the parchment still folded in his pocket, _just more questions?_

* * *

 ** _A/N:_** _Things afoot! Just so you know, I did a broad plan for Nycto and I think it's likely to run to thirty chapters (ish)...so watch this space. Thanks to all of you for being so patient with me - it's been really lovely knowing people are still stumbling across this and enjoying it, and I hope you continue to do so. Much love, as ever. Sxx_


	18. Chapter 18

_**A/N:** Just a little note to say things get a bit bloody in this chapter. _

* * *

**Chapter 18: Fire**

* * *

Hermione took a deep breath and knocked on the door of Theo's room. The rosy dawn light kissed her shoulders through the window on the staircase, and she had just raised her hand to knock again when the door swung open.

"Are you ready?" She fought to keep her voice steady, reasoning with herself that her fear was ridiculous. It had been almost two months since they had visited Thoros in Azkaban, and in that time they had ransacked every available resource to try and prepare themselves. Hermione felt like she knew more about blood magic and warding than anyone could ever wish to.

And still there was a part of her that hoped that Theo's certainty would have waned since the night before; that he would narrow his eyes, and half-smile, and shake his head, and say _no_.

Theo narrowed his eyes, and half-smiled at her. "If you've changed your mind, just tell me," he said.

 _Tell me_. Hermione pursed her lips and fought the urge to scowl at him. His smile turned from quizzical to dangerous, telling her that he knew exactly what he'd said.

"I'm ready when you are, _Nott_." Hermione didn't wait to see his grin widen, instead turning on her heel and starting downstairs, her beaded bag swinging from her hand.

Hermione had told Andromeda of their plan before she and Theo left Grimmauld the night before, a quiet word as they washed the dishes together by hand, not wanting the fuss that announcing their intentions to everyone at dinner would have likely caused. Andromeda's hands had stilled, soap bubbles glittering on her knuckles, and she had given Hermione a long look. "Be careful," was all that she had said.

Theo's smile had faded into a look of grim seriousness by the time he followed Hermione into the living room, his wand held loosely in his left hand as he held his right out towards her, palm open. "Care to do the honours?" he asked.

Hermione sighed, drawing her own wand, and then making a shallow incision from the heel of his hand to the base of his middle finger, as the books had directed them. Theo barely flinched, though she noted that he watched her rather than the blood. "Cross my heart," he muttered, closing his fingers. She watched his knuckles turn white, blood welling through the gaps in his fist, before he opened his hand and took hold of his wand.

"You're sure?" he asked.

Hermione made no answer, but threaded her right arm through the crook of his left, holding his free hand tightly. Theo sighed and gave a nod, before tightened his grip on his wand.

" _Sanguinem invenio._ "

 **OOOOO**

When the whirling feeling of magical transportation stopped Hermione blinked her eyes open gingerly, getting her first look at their surroundings. Rolling hills fell away from them, a few clutches of tree dotted here and there. _The Cotswolds maybe,_ she thought, before she snapped fully back to herself and released her grip on Theo's hand. He glanced down at her, eyebrows quirked, but he didn't say anything as she stepped deliberately away.

"Home sweet home," he muttered from behind her, and when Hermione turned to follow his gaze she felt her breath leave her in a gasp. The house was beautiful: built of dove-grey stone, it rose above a sweeping lawn in clean palladian lines, with a wide, millpond-smooth lake in front of it. Nevertheless as she looked at it, Hermione could feel the swoop of old, strong magic. The obvious corruption in it set her stomach on edge.

She could tell without looking that Theo felt the strong, almost magnetic pull as well, though when he spoke his voice was level. "Whereabouts do you think we are?"

"Somewhere outside Gloucester, if I had to guess," she said thoughtfully, before squinting at the lavender sky. "Though the light is...off. I think…" she frowned, tasting the staleness on the air. "I think we might be in some sort of temporal lacuna," she went on, finally looking at Theo and seeing the minute, tell-tale tightening in his cheek as he absorbed information that he wasn't happy about. It was an odd thing to realise, once again, just how well she had learned to read him.

Theo's eyes met hers, and they stared at one another for a moment before he shifted his weight uncomfortably. Hermione dropped her gaze, blushing delicately. "Old wards," he muttered. "There could be a stasis charm in there. I wonder…" He took Hermione's arm in a firm hold, frowning slightly, and then grimaced when nothing happened. "Anti-apparition too."

"We're stuck then?" Hermione told herself that the sharpness in her voice was not the beginnings of panic.

"Until we dismantle the charms," Theo nodded. Hermione swallowed, taking a deep breath and forcing herself to remain calm. They had been prepared for something like this. It was why she had the beaded bag with her - because they couldn't be sure how long it would take, what they would need.

"Alright then," she muttered, squaring her shoulders. "I guess we should get started."

She set off towards the house, not looking to see if Theo followed. She hadn't gone more than about twenty paces however before she felt the twangy, sticky magic that marked an inner line of warding, and stopped abruptly. By the time Theo reached her side Hermione was casting the first of various detection charms, trying to ascertain the source of the magic that hung heavy on the air, buzzing at the edge of her nerves and making her feel an odd combination of nausea and the urge to sneeze.

"What are you getting?" Theo asked, glancing up towards the house. There was a complex play of emotion on his face, and Hermione wondered how long it had been since he had been back here. Well over a year, she reasoned, even if he had spent the Christmas of his seventh year at home with his father. Having been witness to their exchange in Azkaban, Hermione couldn't see it being a particularly festive holiday.

She cast another _Revelio_ , and frowned as the air rippled, an oily rainbow-shimmer moving across it for a moment. "It's not…" she said slowly, then paused, trying to vocalise what she'd felt in the wards. "There are a lot of layers. Something very old, and," she darted a glance at Theo, trying to hide her wince. "Pretty dark, as far as I can tell."

"You say that as though you're surprised," Theo smirked, drawing his wand carefully over the same patch of air, and watching as the ripple moved outwards again. Hermione could feel the spells wriggling beneath their investigation, insect-like, and the thought made her flesh crawl.

Theo made a soft humming sound in the back of his throat and leaned forward, squinting slightly. "You're right," he said. "These are very old, but I've never - they weren't active before..." He jabbed his wand forward. " _Aperio cantatum!_ "

Fine threads of black spread outwards from his wand, delineating in a flash the outline of the warding. Hermione was reminded of the spells that the teachers had invoked to protect Hogwarts before the final battle, except that where those charms had glowed with protective power, these were seemingly constructed out of scraps of shadow. As they watched, the lines of black writhed and turned a deep, unmistakeable crimson.

"Right then," Theo said, his face grim.

"We knew it might be -" Hermione started to say, and then stopped herself. They had known that there might be blood wardings, but had hoped that there would be nothing of quite this cadre of nastiness. She thought back to the many books that they had pulled from the shelves in the Black library; to the disgust that had shown itself on Theo's face as he had read the spells inside them.

" _Sanguis dijudicatem_ ," he muttered now, and his eyes flicked down to her. It was one of the oldest, most unpleasant blood wardings that they had come across, and Hermione knew that without some very careful casting on their parts it would react extremely poorly to her Muggle heritage.

Theo was reaching a hand forward, his eyes half-closed, as though he might be able to tease the spell out by hand, and Hermione reached out and caught his wrist. "Please be careful!" She returned his quizzical look with a glare, and Theo smiled.

"These are my wards, set in place by my blood." His eyes moved across her face, and Hermione felt it heat. Always blood; in her cheeks, across his palm.

 _On the Ministry's hands, if we don't act soon_ , she thought, giving herself a little shake and breaking Theo's stare. "It doesn't hurt to be cautious." Then, "s _anguis dijudicatem_ ," she repeated softly. "We can't lift it can we?"

"Not as such," Theo said, and Hermione bit her lip, earning herself another teasing smile. "It's probably been in place for about a couple of hundred years at least, so any attempt to lift the spell could risk compromising the whole property. No," Theo looked back at the web of gleaming red filaments, "but we should be able to persuade it to let you past."

Hermione nodded. "You need my blood for that, right?"

"Yes," Theo said, reaching for her hand and then stopping abruptly. "Do you - erm - that is, would you prefer…?"

"Go ahead," she said, spreading the fingers of her left hand so that he could open her palm with with a wordless _Diffindo_. When Theo pressed his own bloodied hand against hers Hermione swallowed, her heart racing as she lifted her wand, pressing the tip to Theo's.

Their eyes met, and Hermione tried to ground herself in that now so-familiar hazel as he whispered, " _Deterritum collocupletare_." She felt strange, off-balance, and leaned forward towards Theo almost unthinkingly as he did the same to her.

They felt the tug at the same moment, the blood sizzling between their palms as magic flared from the joined tips of their wands. Both jolted upright in time to see the bright silver glow of the blood-spell leap from their wandtips to uncurl itself into the wall of red, channels of light running along the magical threads. The two of them waited, barely daring to breathe as the silvery glow faded gradually back into deep scarlet. Finally Theo dropped her hand and Hermione exhaled the breath she hadn't realised she'd been holding. "Did it - did it work?" Her voice sounded too loud in the unnaturally still air.

Theo shook his head slowly, a slight frown on his face as he said, "I don't -" Before he could finish his sentence however the silver spell-light suddenly burst forward once more, but almost immediately it started to roil darkly, deepening into what Hermione could only describe as a black glow, the threads of magic turning a deep, glittering obsidian that began to thicken and spread outwards like oil to form an opaque wall before them. "Shit," Theo breathed, but the word was barely audible as a vicious wind whipped itself from nowhere. A hot, bitter scent like burning tar filled the air and within the blackness a humanoid shape started to form.

"What's happening?" Hermione cried, stumbling backwards. She caught the horrified look on Theo's face as he stepped slightly in front of her, eyes wide and staring, as the shape shimmered slightly in the air, stretching and then coalescing into - "Is that - a Dementor?" she breathed, her stomach dropping with sudden fear. She had never been that good at the Patronus charm, and as far as she knew Theo didn't even know it, and what had they been thinking - but how could they have expected _this_ -

"I don't -" Theo started to say, but quieted as the heat in the air dissipated abruptly, leaving behind a hollow, horribly familiar cold. It must be a Dementor, Hermione reasoned to herself, although she had never seen one uncloaked before, but this shape of gleaming, putrescent-looking flesh was surely -

Theo reached behind himself, catching hold of the hand that she had cut open and gripping it tightly in his own. "Stay very still," he breathed, as the creature took a terrible, slithering step towards them, the rotting, corrupted smell intensifying as it drew closer. Hermione could feel a staticky charge within the cold, making the fine hairs on her arms stand on end. In front of her Theo lifted his wand and sent a wordless hex towards the shape that seemed to be formed of equal parts flesh and dark magic.

The bright rope of red light struck its mark - and was absorbed into the grey substance of it. The thing stopped its advance, halting a few feet from them, and opened the thin slash of its mouth to reveal sharp, yellowing teeth - too many sharp yellow teeth - and a long, black tongue that licked out to taste the hot air. There was a low, grating rumble and Hermione realised with a nauseous swoop of her stomach that the creature was laughing.

"What is this that you have brought for us, Theodore?" The voice was like nails on a blackboard, a hoarse, disused screech, and the thing turned its eyeless face slowly back and forth.

 _Like a dog sniffing the air_ , Hermione thought, horrified and transfixed as its neck rolled and stretched in a way that was simply _wrong_. "The last heir of the great House of Nott, come to lay claim to your inheritance." With a sound like sandpaper the creature laughed again. "Such a pity that your father failed to mention our duty to your blood."

"If you serve my blood," Theo said, his grip threatening to crush Hermione's fingers, "You will let me and my companion pass, and you will -"

"We serve the pure blood of the House of Nott," the creature said in its scratchy, whispering voice. "Your father raised our warding when he left this place, and we will not be denied the price of our service."

Its voice crawled like a buzzing insect, making Hermione want to clap her hands over her ears, shake her head and drive it out.

"But what a tribute you bring!" The creature exhaled a mocking rasp, tilting its head once again as though considering them. "Such magic! Courage and power, youth and beauty and a full, beating heart." It drew out the last words, seeming to savour them, and Hermione felt that heart start to pound with terror.

"Stay back!" Theo growled, making to hit the creature with another spell, but it raised a skeletal hand, fingers open, and he went unnaturally still.

"We are made of your blood, Theodore," the creature hissed, making a vicious little twisting gesture with its outstretched hand, and Hermione saw Theo's face tighten as though in sudden pain. "And we are charged to defend this place at any cost," the thing went on, and Hermione watched in mute horror as its upheld arm lengthened into a vaporous tendril of the same shadow-stuff from which it had seemed to form, curling forward and then forcing itself into Theo's mouth, which opened into a silent scream as the creature smoked and dissolved once more, the thick blackness flowing into Theo's body.

"No!" Hermione's shout tore raggedly from her throat as she ripped her hand from Theo's grasp, grabbing at his shoulder and trying to pull him to face her, rushing around to beat her fists against his chest when he remained immobile. "Theo!" she yelled, her voice cracking over his name, and slowly his head tipped forward to stare down at her.

It was a odd, twitching movement, and Hermione had to stop herself from gagging when she saw his eyes, which had turned to a uniform, smoky black. The thing inside Theo lifted his hand jerkily and Hermione cringed as his long fingers stroked down her face before closing around her neck, his other hand clamping around the wrist of her wand arm and holding it between the two of them.

"Oh yes, pretty one," Theo's voice had become a low, cruel purr that made her cringe. "If the blood cannot be trusted, then it must still be defended, and we will not let you escape again."

 _Again?_ Hermione thought dimly, as she choked and squirmed against the iron grip of Theo's fingers. She could feel his quick breath on her ear, smell the burning rot of it as she fought to free herself. Desperately she swung her left hand back, landing it against Theo's cheek in a stinging slap, the half-dried blood on her palm leaving a vivid stain on his skin. Around her neck his hold slackened minutely and she gasped a breath. "Please, Theo," she croaked, words whipped away from her by the still-howling wind almost as soon as they were spoken.

His fingers twitched against her neck, enough that she could gulp another breath of the stinging, freezing air. She saw the flash of hazel in his eyes, and Theo shook his head and stared at her in bleak horror as he gasped, "Herm-" He tailed off into a low gurgle and then that horrible mockery of a smile returned to his face as his eyes turned black once more.

"We think not," Theo's mouth moved, but it was the creature that spoke, turning his voice from a purr to a blade. Theo's grip tightened again on her arm and throat, and Hermione felt the white-hot pain as a bone snapped in her wrist, though with her head spinning from the lack of air she seemed to feel it only at a distance.

 _Come back, Theo_ , Hermione thought desperately, summoning her strength and lifting her free hand to cup his cheek, covering the bloodstain and searching the jet-black nothingness that had replaced Theo's bright, clever eyes, hoping to see some hint of him. He trembled violently at her touch, seeming to try at once to lean into it and to wrench his head away.

A horrible, guttural laugh spilt from Theo's mouth as it stretched into an eerie, too-wide smile. "You think to overpower us, little Mudblood?" Hermione tried not to flinch at the word, knowing that Theo would _never_ \- but his face was bending down towards hers, the grip on her throat changing to lift her chin, and she looked up into foul darkness where there should have been autumn hazel. "So much faith in him, and he's barely even tasted you."

Hermione breathed in as deeply as she could with her bruised throat, hating herself for what she was about to do, but unable to think of any alternative. Closing her eyes she felt inside herself for the tug of the Vow - subdued somehow, but _there_. As soon as she felt it hum to life about her wrist, Hermione acted on pure instinct, slipping her hand from Theo's cheek to slide her fingers into the hair at the back of his neck. "One way to fix that," she whispered as, eyes still clenched shut so as to avoid the terrible blackness of his gaze, she yanked Theo's face the last inch towards hers.

Hermione crashed their mouths together, the hot, rich taste of her blood mixing with his when she sunk her teeth viciously into first her own and then Theo's lower lips, coating her tongue and dispelling her dizziness entirely. She felt him convulse against her as she swiped her tongue across his and then she drew back just enough that she could whisper against his mouth: "You swore a Vow, Theo." Hermione licked the metal tang of her own blood from his lips. "Now come back to me, I _command_ you."

There was a scream of pure rage but it sounded far off: an ancient, echoing fury. Theo's body went rigid, his hand squeezing so tight on Hermione's neck that she saw starbursts against her closed eyelids, and then as the screaming pitched to a crescendo the tension in his body seemed to break. She felt him suck a great breath from her own mouth, and then his hand released her neck and moved to cup the back of her head, holding her face to his, and he was pressing his mouth back against hers, kissing her fervently as his fingers wove into her hair, his other hand slackening its vice-like grip on her arm and stroking up and over her shoulder before slipping down her back to wrap around her waist.

Theo's tongue pushed against her lips and Hermione's mouth gasped open once more to admit him, her body moulding against his as she gripped the jut of his shoulder blade with her good hand. His embrace had turned from a prison to a sanctuary, and the two of them clung to one another, faces pressed together as the ground shook beneath them and the storm howled its fury all about.

 **OOOOO**

 _Darkness and freezing fire and everywhere dark and burning cold and terrible and the pain of it, the horrible searing bite of flames made from shadow that were devouring him from the inside out -_

He felt, as though from miles away, a different pain, heard her voice far off - a choked whisper - and he pushed his way to the surface to try and say her name, to see her eyes bright and terrified staring up at him, but then he was flung back and drowning in the vile conflagration.

 _No!_ Theo thought helplessly, but he couldn't see anything, couldn't feel anything but the agony of the thing possessing his flesh, the terrible whisper-song of it filling his mind - _your blood your blood your blood._

He had to be dying, Theo thought; there was no way his body could survive this; and he wanted to scream, wanted to turn his face towards the feeling like a memory of her hand upon his cheek, the dimmest recollection, the number of times that they had touched so small as to be counted on the fingers of one hand -

A hot, sharp pain of an entirely different kind burst at the edge of his waning consciousness, and Theo tasted blood - metal, salt - and _Hermione_. The dark thing that had taken possession of him roared with rage inside his mind, and distantly he was aware that her mouth was there, that her lips were brushing against his: "...I _command_ you."

It was as though a string tied to his sternum had been given a great, agonising yank, and then the full sensation of her kiss exploded over his senses. He felt the darkness shoved from him in an explosion of magic, the creature's terrible presence forcibly banished from his mind as he came back to himself with a great gasp. Hermione's mouth was pressed against his and Theo didn't give himself time to think as he threw himself into her kiss, moving his hand from the soft skin of her throat and threading his fingers in her hair and around her waist, holding her against him as their mouths moved together.

He felt her small hand tense on his back as the storm around them gathered in fury, and Theo wrapped his arms around her, trying to shield her with his body, pressing his cheek to the top of her head and breathing the wonderful scent of her wild hair as the sky seemed to crash down around them.

 _A Nott must have -_

 _A Nott must -_

 _A Nott -_

* * *

 ** _A/N:_** _So, fun fact, I wrote a version of this chapter approximately eight months ago, before I'd finished writing **It is the Cause, My Soul** , and when **Nyctophilia** was just a germ of an idea. What's ended up here looks pretty different from what I wrote then, but the upshot of it is, we're getting to the meat of the story now. Exciting times everyone! Thank you all for your lovely reviews for the last chapter, I'm so happy to be back with this story and delighted that you're still along for the ride._


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter 19: Fall**

* * *

It felt like a long time before Hermione realised that the wind had dropped. Her face was buried in Theo's shoulder, his arms wound tight around her, one hand cupping the back of her head. His chest rose and fell against hers, fast but steady, and belatedly Hermione remembered to breathe, gasping at air that tasted clean and crisp - no longer dank and rotten as it had been when that _thing -_

Hermione scrunched her eyes tighter. The magic of it had been pure wrongness, upside-down and back to front and exactly the sort of thing that happened when magic ran amok. That feeling in the air: the stillness of a dissipated storm. It was the after-effect of a massive release of magical energy, she knew, and vaguely she wondered if she should have been more worried, but her head was strangely foggy, unable to focus.

Enough; enough for now that they were alive, that she, that _Theo_ was standing _._ She clung to him, to the pure, tangible fact of Theo, who was alright, who was OK, whose heart beat and chest rose and who held her close, strong and steady and sure.

She had crossed a line, she knew - _teeth in his lip and blood on her tongue and come back, come back, I command you come back -_ but she was too exhausted to stop herself from pressing her face to his chest and inhaling his steady calm; tangible as the the softness of the jumper he wore. It had once been her father's but now smelled of long afternoons in the library at 12 Grimmauld Place, of coffee and swapped notes over breakfast in her kitchen. Of the woody warmth that she had come to associate with Theo, with home; with _safety_.

"Hermione," he whispered, his voice rasping across her name as though his throat had been torn ragged. The sound seemed both very far away and far too loud, and Hermione didn't reply. They were still, and calm, and safe, and she turned her head to lay her cheek, her ear, more firmly to his chest. She took another deep breath of the petrichor-scented air; so fresh it almost stung, and listened.

She listened, in one ear, to the insistent beat of Theo's heart. In the other, the first, trilling notes of birdsong, that had been so conspicuously missing from the heavy silence that had reigned before.

Theo's thumb stroked over her temple and his touch, his heartbeat...both seemed to hold the echo of her own voice - _you're safe, it's over_ \- and she felt the duality, herself both here in his arms and back in her house, positions reversed, her arms wrapped around Theo as he yelled himself free of his nightmare that first morning in her house.

But no - this was a different Theo. He had been so thin then; nothing but skin and bone and fear and fury; the feral grace of his jumpiness, the sharp darkness in his eyes when he had glared at her...

"Hermione." Theo said her name again, the slightest catch of impatience making his lips press tight around it as he took a step back from her. Hermione trembled, forced back to the present, to the sudden chill of his absence, but the next thing she knew his fingers were beneath her chin, turning her face up towards his, and she opened her eyes to his hazel gaze.

When he looked at her now his eyes were warm, steady; bright with concern as they made a quick catalogue of her face. Theo didn't let go of her chin as he turned it to look more closely at what she had to assume were smears of blood across her cheeks, down over her lips, matching the scarlet that marked his face.

"Are you hurt?" Theo asked, and though his voice was low she heard the rasp in it again, and flinched in spite of herself, remembering the crawling badness of the revenant on his tongue. His eyes narrowed, something of the wild-animal edge returning in a blaze of agitation as she still didn't answer. "Hermione!"

The fierceness of his tone pierced the fuzziness that was edging across her senses, and Hermione frowned as she gazed back at him, her mind still turning with frustrating slowness as she tried to think of the answer.

"My wrist," she said finally, feeling only a dull throb as she held it up to him. Theo grimaced, removing his hand from her chin to take her arm gently, placing his wand to her skin and murmuring an _Episkey._

Hermione gave a hiss of pain as the shattered bones re-knit themselves, and then shook her head as the sparks of Theo's spell melted into her skin: waking her, finally, from what she realised was a shock reaction.

"Ow," she said aloud, trying to pull her arm from Theo's grip, but he didn't let go, his expression darkening as anger won out against concern.

"Back with me are you?" he almost growled, and when she glared back at him he gave her arm a little shake. "What the fuck were you _thinking_ , Granger? You could have got yourself killed!"

 _Or worse,_ she remembered, _expelled._ Fighting a highly inappropriate smirk with a scowl she tried to wrench her arm from his grasp. "I thought I told you to call -"

"Fine," Theo snapped. "That was an unutterably stupid thing to do, _Hermione._ "

"Well I'm _so_ sorry." She heard the scorn in her voice and was powerless to stop it, even as her brain kicked belatedly into gear to ask why, exactly they were practically screaming at one another when - "I'll just let the revenant burn its way out of you next time, shall I?"

"There isn't going to be a next ti-" Theo seemed to catch himself by an effort of will, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath through his nose. "A spirit revenant?"

 _We are made of your blood, Theodore_ , it had grinned, and something had clicked into place. The notes spread across her kitchen table in Theo's neat handwriting - _the spirit trapped in service with runes painted upon its bones in Noble blood that has been let under the new moon,_ _the bones then to be bound in oleander and buried at the cardinal points along the ward line._

It was dark, cruel, highly malevolent magic, and even having met Theo's father, Hermione wouldn't have believed that he would invoke a ritual so very unpleasant until she had seen it with her own eyes.

But that was neither here nor there.

"I read your notes, you know," she poked Theo in the chest with her so-very-recently healed hand. "Don't think that just because I've been working on that bloody bill -"

"How?" Theo interrupted her. "How did you know how to stop it?"

"I -" Hermione paused, blinking in confusion. "I remembered."

 _ARE YOU A WITCH OR NOT?_ The old reminder - Ron yelling at her across eight years - and she hadn't panicked this time; she had been calm, had followed her instincts, and remembered - what?

 _By the magic in my blood; by the Vow on my lips -_

Hermione frowned up at Theo. "It wasn't in your notes," she said softly. "But I remembered."

Theo's mouth had set into a deeply unhappy line. "It wasn't in my notes," he agreed. "Draco interrupted me when I was reading about revenant wards, but there wouldn't have been much point anyway."

"Why?" Hermione asked, feeling a chill down her spine.

"Because it's supposed to be unbreakable," his voice was very quiet. "Superseded only by an obligation of the blood that pre-dates the ward itself."

"Your Vow -" Hermione started to say.

"Was sworn after my father's arrest." Theo's hand was a steady pressure on her wrist as they stared at one another. "It wouldn't supersede it unless -"

"An obligation of the blood," Hermione said slowly. "I - when I -"

Theo's eyes searched hers. "My father knew you would come with me," he said softly. "And he must have known your blood would break the wards, which means -"

Hermione shook her head, her mind leaping forward when Theo's eyes widened. "I did a DNA - I tested myself and my parents," she said quietly. "When I was fifteen, when no-one would believe that I was - that I was actually - but I _am_ ," the word was almost defensive, and she took a breath to steady herself before she continued. "I _am_ a muggleborn, so how -"

"I guess...he could have got your blood at Malfoy Manor." Theo said, his forehead creasing with perplexity. "He knew who you were, he recognised you - but he was surprised at Azkaban, and why would he -"

"He wanted us to come here," Hermione whispered. "He wanted _me_ to - he told you how after he recognised me. I - _something_ made sense to him, seeing me there at Azkaban."

"Then why not just tell us?" His fingers tightened on her wrist as he yanked her closer to him. "Why let us come here with no warning if - unless it's some sort of…" Theo trailed off, finally dropping Hermione's hand to run both of his through his hair. " _Fuck_ ," he groaned, dragging his palms down his face and glaring towards the dove-grey Manor that sat innocently, surrounded by verdant lawns. "What the _fuck_ are you playing at Father -"

Abruptly he pulled away from her, stalking away towards the house. With his much longer stride Hermione had to jog to even try and catch up with him. "Theo!" she yelled, making a grab for his arm. "Theo, _stop_ \- look at me!"

She nearly stumbled when he came to an abrupt halt, his hand reaching for the front door. "Say that again," Theo said, his voice low and urgent, and belatedly Hermione realised what she'd done, what she'd - but Theo was looking straight ahead, he wasn't -

"Look at me," she whispered, lifting her hand as though to place it between his shoulderblades, but pausing to watch as the mark from the Vow glittered lazily, unbroken, around her wrist. Disbelieving, Hermione counted the silent seconds in which he did not turn around, before - "Shit," she breathed eventually, unsure in that moment whether she wanted to laugh or cry.

And then Theo, still without turning, was reaching behind himself to grab her arm, pulling her round so that she stood between him and the door as he stared down at the gold around her wrist; at the corresponding, unbroken mark around his own.

"You didn't lift it?" he asked, his gaze intent and voice taut.

"No." She swallowed nervously, watching the play of emotion across his face. When he lifted his eyes to hers she was alarmed to see the raw fear in his gaze. "What's -"

"I can hurt you," he said flatly, grimacing when she frowned in confusion. "Whatever the fuck it is that you did to destroy that warding, you've somehow managed to take away your best line of defence against whatever fucking _nightmare_ my father left lying in wait for us, all because you're too bloody impetuous to -"

The noise of the slap was loud in the clear air, and Theo blinked, his pale cheek reddening as he levelled a glare that Hermione was almost too preoccupied staring in horror at her hand to return. " _What_ was that for?" he growled.

"What would you have had me do, let it kill the both of us?" She smacked both palms against his chest, glowering when Theo caught her wrists. "This is just like the Department of Mysteries," she went on, tasting the magic, the truth of it on the air. _All that power_ \- "All that old magic all over the place, going haywire, and it's just getting worse, so who's to say that -"

"That wily bastard." Theo's mouth twisted as he finished her thought. "Feeding us to the wolves just to see who'll get bitten."

There was quiet for a moment as they scowled at one another, and Hermione suddenly became aware of how close they stood; of Theo's hands, still braceleting her wrists.

"Of course," she said quietly. "If the Vow isn't working, then you're free."

Theo blinked, then gave a humourless little laugh. "And you think that you can trust me to be _free_ , do you?" His eyes flashed in the low sunlight as he took a step forward, and Hermione moved back in spite of herself, starting with surprise when her shoulders hit the wooden door. Theo leaned in, keeping his firm hold on her hands, and Hermione forced herself to swallow.

Once again she was assailed by memory - her mind seemingly caught between past and present as she recalled that first conversation in her kitchen, months ago, when she had told him of her suspicions about the Unravelment, about the Department of Mysteries. When he had held the knife to her throat and she had waited, breathlessly, to see what he would do.

Now, with every sense full of storm and magic and Theo, Hermione felt her heart race again, and knew that it was not from fear.

She forced herself to take a breath: sage-green and wood-warmth and Theo and _,_ in spite of everything, _safe_. She closed her eyes, holding herself as still as she possibly could.

"If you're free then it means that you have a _choice_ ," she whispered, tipping her chin upwards. "And yes, I trust you."

 _Bend or break_ , she thought desperately, wondering - hoping -

After a long moment she felt Theo's nose bump against hers, his breath warm against her lips. "You're a fool," he said softly.

"Then don't indulge my foolishness." The words were almost soundless, more of a movement than a noise.

"I find -" Theo released her wrists, ran one hand up the side of her neck, the other moving to grasp her hip "- that I am compelled to disobey."

 **OOOOO**

His mind whirled with the possibilities, with the danger that it put her in. He couldn't shake the idea that the revenant ward had been some sort of test, that his father must have laid a deeper trap that was just waiting for them to stumble into now that the Vow wasn't working.

But he could _feel_ it, the connection of the Vow still there, still unbroken - and yet her words didn't hold him, were suddenly just _words_ , and she was looking at him, her eyes huge and dark, and everything, just, _everything_ that he had longed for.

"Tell me to stop," he whispered, winding his fingers into her ridiculous hair as he moved his lips across her jaw. Hermione twisted in his grasp so that she could look at him, her eyes alight with confusion before her mouth made a little 'o' of understanding and she fisted her hand in his jumper.

"Stop," she breathed, turning her head again so that her lips grazed his with the word, and though Theo had told her that he didn't care, that he would want it Vow or no, he couldn't deny the giddy feeling of _knowing_ that this was what he chose. There was a thrill to hearing the spell in her words and disregarding it, obeying instead the wordless demand of her hands, of her quickened breath against his mouth.

 _Not like this._ Three words that for months had caught him like a trap; and when, finally, Theo closed that last infinitesimal distance between them, it was nothing like before.

Before, there had been his need for her warmth, the reassurance of her after Azkaban. Before, there had been her fierce call to him as the revenant wore his flesh.

This - the first time - was just a gentle brush of his lips across hers. Was a pause just long enough for a breath; for the world to tip minutely upon its axis before settling itself anew.

"Theo," Hermione breathed, dancing her fingers over his cheek, and then he was pressing his lips against hers once more, this time with all the desperation, all the brokenness and all the desire, the need to taste her, to devour her, to have her be his.

 _How would it have been_ , he wondered, as she moaned into his mouth, as she dug her fingers into the meat of his shoulder.

How would it have been to love her when he had first wanted to, when he had first looked at her and felt his heart clench for her cleverness, his fingers itch to touch something that burned so brightly? Impossible, but still, he felt the furious waste of years of knowing her as his hand moved from her hip to her waist, thumb grazing the underside of one breast through her blouse.

Hermione responded with a sigh, with teeth closing gently on his lip, and he wanted her like he had never allowed himself to want anything. The sound of her, the feel, the _taste_. She was incandescence, chaos and calm, and Theo was lost to her, his hand under her thigh, lifting her against the door, pressing himself against her, her hands under his jumper and skimming his bare -

The door opened and the two of them pitched forward, Theo barely managing to catch his weight on one hand as he narrowly avoided crushing Hermione beneath him.

He looked up, straight into a large pair of bright, violet eyes.

"Young Master Theodore and Young Miss is taking far too long," the house elf said, ears quivering with disapproval. "Trinculo is not having time to be kept waiting."

* * *

 _ **A/N:** I promise this isn't abandoned! However long it takes me to update, it will be updated. There is a plan, and I'm following it, but RL commitments mean I don't get as much time as I'd like, and with three WIPs on the go, sometimes the muse just isn't with one or other of them. Thank you thank you thank you for reading - picking back up is always made so much easier by knowing that people want to know what happens!_


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter 20: Wait**

* * *

"Trinculo," Hermione repeated the elf's name dazedly, half-distracted by the way the light hugged the angle of Theo's jaw as he clenched it above her. She was never going to get used to house elves, she thought, as Theo pulled her up from the floor and she turned to meet the little creature's baleful glare.

"Young Master and Miss is taking far too long with tongue-fighting," the elf scolded, ears twitching with indignation. Hermione heard herself make a strangled noise of embarrassment, but beside her Theo gave a bark of surprised laughter.

"Stop teasing her," he said. "You're worse than Feste. I'm assuming she's still here as well?"

"Trinculo will do as Trinculo pleases," the elf muttered darkly, then spoiled the effect by winking extravagantly in Hermione's direction before turning to Theo. "Feste is in the library waiting for Young Master and Miss."

"Waiting?" Theo asked, with a faint frown.

"Yes," Trinculo replied. "Doings to be done." His over-large eyes flicked briefly back to Hermione, and narrowed slightly. "Doings to be undid," he added cryptically, before bowing low and extending a hand, in a gesture somehow both formal and deeply sardonic, towards the wide stairs that swept upwards into the house. "If Young Master and Miss will follow Trinculo?"

It was only when he pulled her after him that Hermione realised she and Theo were still holding hands, his grip insistent without being painful. "Theo," she whispered, once she estimated that Trinculo was far enough ahead of them, "'Doings to be undid'?"

His frown deepened as his eyes remained fixed on Trinculo's back, and for a long moment he walked in silence, before -

"Does it strike you as odd," Theo asked quietly, "that they aren't surprised that we're here?"

Hermione heard what he didn't say - _that they aren't surprised we got past the wards_ \- and felt a shiver run down her spine that had nothing to do with the cool air of the house.

They followed Trinculo along a landing panelled in oak the colour of burnt toffee, Hermione watching from the corner of her eye as the fingers of Theo's free hand trailed across the walls and along the sideboards. Around them old magic seemed to twitch upon the air, ancient spells flickering briefly into life as they passed, leaving a faint scent of burning matches.

She remembered how 12 Grimmauld Place had shivered and shimmered around Narcissa and Andromeda when they had first returned: an ancient house welcoming pure descendants of the family line.

Nott Manor had been Theo's home, Hermione kept reminding herself; no matter what had transpired within these walls, this was where he grew up, and barring his father he was the last of the family. Small wonder the magic of the house reacted to his presence, she thought, as dust motes danced in impossibly complex spirals in the bars of sunlight along the corridor. It still didn't explain what had happened with the wards.

She could feel Theo practically thrumming with tension at her side, and gave the hand she held a gentle squeeze. He looked down at her with a tight half-smile, just as Trinculo led them through the wide doors into the library.

"Young Master!"

Hermione was distracted from her first impression - a tantalising maze of high shelves, a delicate staircase spiralling upwards, and a large, gleaming mirror against one wall reflecting the morning sunlight - by the appearance of a second elf, hobbling across the room, her movements slow and precise. Hermione glanced to her side quickly enough to see Theo's smile falter slightly, his expression softening with concern.

"Feste," he said, releasing Hermione's hand and dropping to his knees before the elf, who on closer inspection was shrunken and wizened.

"Young Master," the elf - Feste - repeated, softer this time as she raised a long-fingered hand to press a gentle touch to Theo's cheek. The joints of her hand and wrist were swollen and arthritic, her expression unmistakably maternal as she gazed at Theo. For a moment neither of them moved, and Hermione was on the point of taking a step back, feeling as though she were intruding, before Theo groped blindly behind himself, catching at her robes and pulling her forward.

"This is Hermione Granger, Feste," he said. "My - er -"

Feste looked up at Hermione, her eyes no less sharp for being clouded by age, and nodded slowly. "Yours," she said quietly. "Yes, Feste can see this."

"Um." Hermione found herself uncomfortably reminded of Thoros Nott's cryptic stare - _I see it now_ \- but Feste's gaze was warm, her smile kind, and in any case it didn't seem that Hermione was expected to respond. Before she could think of a word to say, the little elf had turned on her heel and begun to hobble back towards one of the tables that sat in the central part of the library, where a large pile of notebooks and papers had been assembled.

Theo stood up quickly, and when he looked down at Hermione his expression was serious, his gaze intense enough to make her blush. "House elves," he said. "They -"

"Come!" Feste's papery voice was piercing enough to cut off whatever Theo had been going to say, and he offered Hermione an apologetic smile before he turned to follow, his hand ghosting briefly across her arm and raising goosebumps on her skin that had nothing to do with the crackle of magic in the air. As she followed him closer to the table however, Hermione saw Theo's face fall into a frown, before he looked over to where the two elves now stood by a pair of stiff-backed chairs.

"What is this?" Theo asked, and for a moment the light in the room chilled, the lamps guttering and the shadows between the bookshelves deepening.

"Mistress is telling Feste and Trinculo that Young Master will be coming back, will be needing to see Master's things," Trinculo said, gesturing towards the tabletop. "His readings, his notings, his thinkings and wonderings, his -"

"Mistress?" Theo's voice had lost all his softness as he stared at Feste. "You mean my mother? When did she tell you this?" For a moment Hermione could see the pureblood command in him, before the muscle at the corner of his mouth jumped and she realised that it wasn't arrogance that whetted his voice, but fear.

Hermione didn't miss the quick glance that the elves shared, and by the way his jaw tightened, she knew that Theo hadn't either.

"Long times ago," Feste answered eventually, "But we is not forgetting."

"Not forgetting?" Theo said incredulously, "Why wouldn't you say be-"

"If you knew Theo was coming back then why were the wards raised?" Hermione stepped between Theo and Feste as they glared at one another. "That thing out there could have killed us - it would have killed us if I hadn't - what was the point?"

"Master is raising the wards," Feste's answer was reluctant, but definite. "Is saying is to stop the bad wizards, the not-wizards, the impure -"

"You mean the muggle-borns?" Hermione asked, her hackles rising in spite of her peace-making intentions.

Feste gave a stiff roll of her shoulders that seemed to be an approximation of a shrug. "What Master is meaning to do and what Master is doing is not always the same," she said. "Is trying to change things that is not changing, will not be changing and -"

"What are you talking about?" Theo asked. "Feste you have to - why have you done this?"

Feste narrowed her eyes at him, but it was Trinculo who answered. "Because Mistress said so," he said pertly. "Is saying to have everything ready for when Young Master returns from the wars, and is saying not to tell."

Hermione found herself looking from one elf to the other; of the two of them it was Feste who met her eye as she asked, "You obeyed your dead Mistress over your living Master?"

At this, Feste seemed to swell with indignation. "We is obeying both," she said. "Master Thoros is saying to hold the house against impure bloods, impure magics. Is what Trinculo and Feste is doing."

Beside Hermione, Theo made a strangled noise that was halfway between a laugh and an admonishment. "I don't know if my father would agree with -"

"We is obeying him _precisely_ ," Feste said flatly, before her eyes moved back to Hermione once more. "We is serving the House of Nott, the wishes of the House. We is doing what is best. Is Young Master displeased?"

There was a beat of silence as Theo blinked in surprise. "Well," he said. "Well, obviously not, but -"

"Good." Feste gestured behind her. "Is everything Young Master and Miss will be needing for their researchings. Now," she drew herself up to her full, tiny height. "Is there being any refreshments wanted?"

 **OOOOO**

They had been reading for hours and Theo was starting to get a crick in his neck. Even with a cushioning charm the stiff chairs of the Nott library were no match for Hermione's armchairs, nor even those at Grimmauld Place. Trinculo had bustled through an hour or so before, lighting the lamps and setting out a tray with a selection of light supper items that would have only sufficed to feed around 15 people.

He had been sneaking looks across the table every so often, noting the way that Hermione's expression mutated from the suggestion of a frown into a deep line scored between her eyebrows.

"There's so much here," she said eventually, shoving the book she was reading away and reaching up to rub at her forehead. Theo sighed and closed the near-impenetrable rumination on Mysterious Topology (which had been causing the blood to reverberate in his temples with a dull, aching thud) as Hermione continued, "And none of it makes any sense of anything, because far be it from your father to leave his notes in _order_ , or with any sort of a coherent _indexing_ system, or -"

"Forgive me" Theo said, "but what were you expecting to make sense? The huge volume of esoteric magical theory that we've just been handed?" He gestured towards the table - "or perhaps your mysterious ward-breaking ability, or the fact that my elves have apparently been waiting nearly a year for us to show up based on instructions from my dead mother, or -"

"Fine!" Hermione pinched the bridge of her nose. "I mean none of it," she sighed. "It's as though we've gone from groping around completely blind, in pitch darkness, to suddenly having all the lights on and no idea which question to ask first."

Theo watched, amused, as she glared at him, stabbing the tabletop with her finger to emphasise the point. Hermione's hair was escaping its bun, her eyes bright and her cheeks gently flushed, and he found himself uncharacteristically distracted from the books laid across the table in front of him.

Hermione, oblivious to his scrutiny, grabbed another book from the stack in front of her. "And look at this!" she said, "Sealed and warded to open only at the command of -" she squinted, and wrinkled her nose at what Theo assumed were archaic runes - "'The highest, most honoured and most ancient house of Nott.'" Her eyes flicked up towards him, "Catchy. But see -"

Theo lowered his eyes obligingly to where Hermione flipped the ornate silver lock, which fell open at her touch. He looked up at her, raising his eyebrows, and Hermione blushed again. "Well," she said. "It isn't as though we're - I'm not -"

"Not a Nott?" Theo asked quietly, sitting back in his chair and folding his arms, watching appreciatively as the blush deepened on her cheeks. He pursed his lips, keeping his face otherwise expressionless. "The Vow - power to command me - essentially gives you the power to command the House."

"It does?" Hermione blinked, clearly caught off-guard. "Well what about the -"

"Not the blood wards," Theo said, shaking his head. "Only a senior member of the household could let you through those." He spread his arms, and shrugged apologetically. "I'm afraid I'm simply the heir."

Hermione gave him a long look, her tirade seemingly forgotten. In the candlelight her eyes were suddenly very dark. "How unfortunate for me," she said quietly, when a few seconds of silence had passed. "To have encumbered myself with somebody so entirely without use."

The air between them shifted, the energy changing, and Theo felt the blood start to sing in his veins as he fought to keep his face neutral. "No use at all?" he asked. "That _is_ terribly unfortunate."

He was full of the memory of the taste of her; of the sound of her breath in his ear and the feeling of holding her in his arms with the determination not to let her go. He held her gaze as he pushed himself upright, as he stepped slowly around the table to sink to his knees beside her chair. Hermione looked down at him, eyes warmed by a fire that had nothing to do with candlelight, and Theo took the opportunity to push an errant curl behind her ear.

"It occurs to me," he said, rising up to follow his hand with his lips, and brushing them across her earlobe as he spoke - "that we might have been able to find a use for me earlier, if Trinculo hadn't interrupted us."

"He and Feste did seem very determined for us to get on with things."

Hermione belied the faint protest by turning her face towards Theo's, and for a moment neither of them moved as they stared at one another, their faces so close that they could breathe one another in. Then Hermione closed her eyes and placed her hand against his chest, leaning in the final few millimetres in until he felt her lips move against his.

"Don't kiss me, Theodore Nott."

* * *

 _ **A/N:** So I was determined to get this chapter up today, because it marks a year since I started this fic (ffs Sally) I promise that you won't have so long to wait before the next update. Thank you all for continuing to support it - **wolfstars, tinyholesinthesky, lunarwhy, themelancholysiren,** and all you other newbies over the last couple of months, I'm looking at you in particular, but also to everyone who has hopped aboard this mad vessel of a story over the last year, this is for all of you!_


	21. Chapter 21

_**A/N** : Hey guess what I did!_

* * *

 **Chapter 21: Slide**

* * *

Hermione sometimes had the feeling that her years of magical education had taught her more about what she didn't know than what she did, and it had taken her a long time to accept that there really were some magics that couldn't be mastered simply by reading about them.

"Don't kiss me, Theodore Nott."

She wasn't sure what made her say it, but she felt Theo's smile, and knew that the stretch of his lips would have sharpened the angle of his cheek where it slanted through the candlelight. She felt the magic of the knowing, tasted the shape of it as she waited for him to make the next move.

"Is there something else that you had in mind?"

He was so close that the words were an almost-kiss, an almost-disobedience that sent a thrill up Hermione's spine. She felt her body reduced to a nexus of constellated points; every suggestion of his touch singing like the blaze of a star.

Around them the air quickened, the old house holding its breath as she slid her hand from his chest to his neck, winding her fingers into the chestnut waves of his hair and tasting enchantment on her tongue. "Just make yourself useful," she murmured.

"So you can use me and cast me aside?" Theo leaned back enough to meet her eye; a teasing distance, just infinitesimally too far away. His gaze was a riot of turning leaves, green and brown and amber gold, but the laughter died and his face turned serious as they stared at one another. "I hope not," he said, very softly.

Hermione held his gaze as she traced the shape of his mouth with her free hand. She felt a fluttering sensation in her chest, as though a flock of birds were caged within her ribs. Here under her fingers was a magic that couldn't be learned from a book, and she thought, strangely, of the way that Harry had adjusted her grip on her wand when he had taught her the Patronus charm.

 _Your happiest memory_ , he'd said. _Something from the heart._

She let the sunburst feeling of Theo's touch alchemise to courage, like the simplest yet most complex of spells. "I wouldn't," she whispered, and then, blurting the words out in a rush that seemed silly and rushed and yet wholly necessary, "I love you."

Theo blinked, his brows twitching together as he smiled quizzically up at her. "Good to know," he said slowly, lifting his hand to hold hers against his cheek.

"Aren't you -" Hermione swallowed, feeling her cheeks heat. Maybe it wasn't what she thought - maybe she had -

Theo tipped his head, canting his grin towards her. "I love you too," he said softly, pressing his lips to the palm of her hand. "I thought you knew that."

Hermione's shocked laugh was cut short as he leaned forward and kissed her, languid and gentle and sure. She tightened her grip on his hair as she lifted her other hand from his jaw, threading her arm under Theo's to grab his shoulder and draw him closer towards her.

His arms came up around her, one palm flattened against the top of her spine and the other at the small of her back, and when she flicked her tongue against his lips he hummed gently, opening his mouth to kiss her deeply, with an enthusiasm that made her toes curl and heat flash low in her belly.

She felt his teeth graze her lip and heard herself moan before she could control it, punishing his snicker with a yank of his hair. Theo answered by moving his hand over her hip and under her bum, squeezing and then lifting her with him as he stood up and spun them across the room.

"Oof," he groaned as he set her down on the desk. "You're heavier than you look."

"Shut up," Hermione grinned, allowing him to lean her back against the pile of papers.

"No," Theo grinned back, a wicked flash in his eyes as he disobeyed her. Hermione ran her hands down his arms and across his ribs, feeling the rise and fall of the quick, sharp breath that he sighed into her when their mouths found each other again.

He was all lean lines and quiet strength and she wanted to touch every part of him, to press her fingers and her mouth to every inch of his skin and tell her she loved him, _she loved him_ -

"I love you," she gasped as his lips moved from her mouth to her neck, and she started to laugh at how silly it was to have fought it for so long, to have tamped down on the feeling and told herself that they couldn't, that it wasn't, that _she_ wasn't -

"Look at me," Theo urged her, and Hermione opened her eyes in time to see him stand up, pushing his overlong hair back from his forehead. His lips were pink and swollen, colour dancing high in his cheeks just as she knew it must be in her own, as he reached for her hand and twined their fingers together.

"There's nobody else but you for me," he said quietly, and if Hermione had suspected that she had been flushed before, now she knew she must be almost scarlet with embarrassment. "And even though you've spent the last few months doing your level best to torture me, I don't think there will ever -"

"I wasn't torturing -"

"You've done nothing but reel me in and then push me away every time I've got close enough to get a touch -" he raised her chin gently, eyes skating across her face "- or a taste, and I've _let_ you, because I knew with the Vow in place you'd never believe I meant it, but I do."

His tone was as firm as the hand that closed on her waist, and Hermione found herself in the strange position of being told something that she couldn't - didn't want to - argue with. She opened her mouth, not quite sure what she was going to say, but Theo cut her off. "Just - please let me say this."

She blinked, nodded, and raised her eyebrows at him expectantly. Theo blew out a breath that carried the shadow of a laugh inside it and squared his shoulders. "I don't know what's happened, how it is that what you did with the revenant ward has fucked with the Vow, and I don't really want to think about just how much trouble we might be in as a result, because every time -"

He paused to smile ruefully as he smoothed his thumb across her knuckles. "Every time I try to be angry with you, I can't help but be glad you did it. Because it means I can do this -" he bent and pressed a chaste, lingering kiss to her mouth "- and be reasonably certain that it won't send you into a spiral of anxiety about whether or not you're taking advantage of me."

"You might still have Stockholm Syndrome," Hermione countered, running her foot up the back of his leg to let him know she wasn't serious.

Theo frowned down at her. "I've never been to Sweden."

"Oh," Hermione laughed. "Oh no it's - it's a muggle thing, for when you -"

"Is this important?" Theo interrupted her. "Do I actually need to know whatever it is you're about to try and teach me?"

"Well, not if you don't -"

"Good," he growled, pulling her to him and kissing her again.

Hermione couldn't help her smile as she opened her mouth to him, delighting in the way that they fit together. She slid a hand under his shirt, trailing her fingers up the taut length of his spine before digging her nails into the meat of his shoulder, her heart skipping when he groaned into her mouth, making a shiver rip its way through her.

Theo moved his mouth to her jaw, to her ear, to the line of her neck, and Hermione let her head tip back as he kissed her clavicle, the exposed line of her sternum, and then pulled her top to the side to tease his lips around the edge of her bra cup. "Oh Christ," she swore, as his tongue flicked across the cotton and she felt her nipple harden. "Theo I - we can't - this is a _library_."

"Merlin's beard," Theo groaned as he raised his head and yanked her from the desk. "You're such a bloody swot."

 **oOo**

Theo pulled her after him along the landing and up the stairs towards his suite. It had never been as grand as Draco's, which had rankled when they were younger, but now, after months in a cell and then in the small, cosy bedroom at Hermione's house, he was glad that his rooms were relatively modest.

The elves had been in earlier, he could see. The lamps were lit and the room smelled of fresh, clean linen, the bed made up in the soft grey cotton that he preferred. Hermione stepped past him, staring up at the walls where a series of dreary landscapes were hung. She paused in front of one which showed a unicorn pawing the ground in a desultory fashion as hippogriffs gambolled in the distance, and Theo winced in embarrassment.

"Quite a collection you've got here," she said, and though he couldn't see her face he could hear her smile.

"My father's notion of what was appropriate for a young wizard," Theo explained. "I think the elves were under instruction to burn anything I tried to put up."

Hermione laughed, moving on to peer at the top of his dresser, where -

"Is this your mother?" she asked quietly, and Theo felt a shock of guilt. He had forgotten that her picture was here, and he crossed the room to stand behind Hermione, watching Aria smile shyly at the camera, then duck her head and blush at whatever the photographer had said to her. She lifted her hand to give a small wave, and then repeated the smile.

Theo's throat ached, and he felt his eyes prickle as he reached out to stroke the side of his mother's face, as he had hundreds of times before.

"You look like her," Hermione said, and Theo smiled sadly, reaching down to weave his fingers with hers. He watched Aria wave again and then turned towards Hermione, who took a deliberate step back towards the bed, drawing him with her with a gentle tug.

"I'd prefer to be ravished here than in your father's library," she said, tilting her face up towards his in what Theo knew was a question. He found himself only too happy to answer, losing himself in the taste of her mouth, the feel of her body against him; the little mewl that he felt vibrate from her chest to his when he swept his hand up her back to pull at her hair.

When Hermione nipped at his lip Theo growled, dropping his hand from her hair to lift her and toss her back onto the bed. She gave a breathy little gasp, her eyes dancing as she pressed herself up on her elbows, reaching out to snag the front of his shirt and pull him to her, wriggling beneath him in a way that made seemingly all his blood rush southwards.

"Fuck," Theo gasped, reaching out blindly and muttering the charm to close the hangings on the bed. When Hermione gave him a questioning look he shrugged one shoulder, and used the opportunity of her head angling to the side to lick a stripe up the side of her neck and make her wriggle again.

"Elves," he muttered between kisses along the neckline of her top, mentally debating simply ripping it. "Always barging in at the most inopportune moment."

He felt a tug on the back of his head and looked up to find her giving him a narrow, amused look. "You sound as though you're speaking from experience."

Theo sighed through his nose, then bracketed her ribcage with his elbows and rested his chin in his hands. "Pansy used to spend a lot of time here every summer, and when she wasn't preoccupied with chasing after Draco I proved to be a good...distraction." He spoke in a garbled rush, wincing over the last word.

There was silence for a moment, but when he cracked one eye open it was to see Hermione biting her lip, clearly trying not to laugh. "Trinculo caught you and Pansy?" she asked.

"Worse," Theo sighed, dropping his chin to rest it on her chest. "Feste."

"Oh God." Hermione smiled, her fingers trailing through his hair, round his ear and then along his jaw to lift his chin towards her. "I'm glad this isn't your first time," she said softly, and Theo started, unprepared for this reaction.

"It isn't yours, is it?" he asked before he could stop himself, and then wondered briefly if it was possible to be any more crass.

"No," Hermione said bluntly before pausing, her torn expression telling Theo she was having one of her internal debates with herself.

"Spit it out, Granger," he muttered, grinning when she swiped at his shoulder.

"I was about to say it feels different with you," she said. "More important, and then you ruined it, you absolute -"

He stopped her, taking advantage of her open mouth to kiss her deeply, and Hermione made a wonderful little noise of surprise before the hand that had so recently smacked at him curved around his neck, pulling him closer.

Theo slid his hands down her sides and then under her top, and Hermione obeyed his wordless question, arching her back and breaking her mouth from his momentarily as he pulled it over her head. As soon as her hands were free she was busying herself undoing the buttons of his shirt, and Theo sat back to tear it off before he kissed her again, his hands skimming the soft contours of her torso, tracing the elastic of her practical, black cotton bra.

"Theo." Hermione's voice was soft as a sigh when he pulled the straps from her shoulders, rolling one nipple between his fingers as his other hand dipped lower, slipping beneath her waistband to find her hot and slick through her underwear.

"Oh," Hermione murmured. "Oh god, I - _Theo_." She gave a squeak as he slid down the bed, undoing her jeans and tugging them from her before knelt and brought his mouth to her, licking the taste of her through her knickers.

Hermione made a sharp, keening noise and Theo glanced up to see that she had tipped her head back, her fingers fisting in the sheets. He smiled, and then whispered " _Evanesco_ ," Hermione's cry of protest lost in a moan as he spread her apart and kissed her, sliding his tongue into her and feeling her pulse around him, against him.

She was hands in his hair; she was the scrape of nails on his skin. She was taste on his tongue and a whispered cry of his name. She was everything, everywhere, as she pulled him back up the bed, pushing his trousers down with her feet and lifting her hips to fit him perfectly inside her.

She was the sweetness of caramel skin and burnt toffee eyes, and the sharpness of white teeth and her fist in his hair. He felt her tighten, saw her eyes go wide and dark, and then a feeling like lightning ripped through him, vision whiting at the edges as he choked her name into her shoulder, sweat-slick but still with that faint rose and roses scent.

"I love you," he heard her whisper later, as they lay curled together. They'd done this so many times before, except that now when he pressed his lips to her shoulder they met bare skin, the same as when he flattened his hand on her stomach.

"You too," he murmured, drawing back a little and running a finger across the birthmark on her shoulder, where two dark freckles were separated by a smudge of dappled brown.

"My mum said it reminded her of the Herd Boy and the Weaving Girl." Hermione's voice was sleepy, the words soft-edged.

Theo frowned, feeling something tickle at his memory. "Remind me?" he asked.

Hermione turned over to smile at him, and Theo caught the gleam of her eyes in the dark. "The ancient Chinese had it that they were lovers, imprisoned in the heavens for defying the gods and doomed to live on opposite sides of the Celestial River except for one day a year, when magpies would fly up to the sky and provide a bridge for them to cross to one another."

Theo furrowed his brow. "The Celestial River?"

Hermione nodded, burrowing her head into the crook of his neck, mumbling the words into his skin. "The Milky Way. And Vega and Altair are the girl and the boy."

"Altair?" Theo repeated, unsure if he'd heard her correctly, and feeling a measure of unease. Hermione nodded, wriggling closer with a sigh, her breaths turning shallower as she went boneless against him. Theo tightened his arm around her, but found that he couldn't sleep, turning the story over and over in his mind. _Altair._

The family records were kept here at the Manor, and his father had had it excised everywhere else after Aria's death, so how would she have known? It wasn't as though Narcissa or Andromeda would have had occasion to say anything, and he doubted Draco even remembered.

He worried at it for what felt like hours, Hermione occasionally fidgeting in his arms, and then just as it seemed that he might be on the edge of sleep he remembered his mother's hand smoothing his hair from his forehead.

 _I had a friend called Vega, and she told me a story about the stars._

An icy sensation trickled down his spine to settle in his stomach like lead, and Theo pulled his arm gently out from Hermione's neck before getting out of the bed, pulling his clothes on as quietly as possible.

 _My little Theodore Altair,_ his mother whispered, her lips against his temple.

 _I had a friend called Vega._

He shut the bedroom door with a quiet _snick,_ casting a quick " _Lumos_ " before padding back down to the library, and the pile of notes into which he had shoved the scrap of paper that he had found in the book at Grimmauld Place.

He could see the looping handwriting in his mind's eye. _V_.

 _Vega_.

* * *

 ** _A/N_** _: Waaaahhh so I'm once again terribly sorry to have kept you waiting. Some real-life changes have meant that I haven't had as much time as I'd like to work on this, and I didn't want to leave you with something sub-par (which I hope you won't think this is). Hopefully my update schedule should pick up from here on out, but having broken many many promises in the past I'm not going to make one now. Thank you so much for sticking with this story - it continues to absolutely delight me that people are reading and enjoying it!_

 _For **sunset oasis** , **cocoartist** , and all the rest of you who have snuck up on me while I've been finicking away with this - I'm going to break my promise about no promises and say I PROMISE this isn't abandoned._


	22. Chapter 22

_**A/N** : Great theories you guys. Very excellent. Please no spoilers if you are kind enough to leave a review..!_

* * *

 **Chapter 22: Find**

* * *

He hadn't noticed the air of the Manor growing cold as he'd lain curled around Hermione, but as Theo picked his way along the silent hallways shivers walked themselves across his skin. Lamps flared into life as he approached, their light dying into the gloom behind him.

Theo rested his hand on the library door, trying to slow his heart, his breathing. His mother's ghost had been quiet for years, but now he could hear her voice as though she stood at his shoulder; could almost feel her lips against his temple, her hand on his cheek as he remembered and remembered and _remembered_ -

 _He was four years old, listening to Aria playing the piano, watching the notes sparkle and dance in a bar of mid-afternoon sunlight that had crept through the tall window towards where he hid beneath his father's desk._

 _He was ten, and his hands shook, and around him the magic rose: a bitter, clawing thing that made the books rattle on the shelves and the inkwell shiver its way across the the leather scrolltop._

 _He was sixteen, and his father was in Azkaban the first time, and as he walked through the unlit halls he felt the itch and sting of the Manor's broken magic trying to burrow its way beneath his skin -_

Theo focussed on his fingers, pale against the wood, as around him magic danced and spun. He could feel the difference in it now; the way that broken enchantments had been made whole; but there was still something unfinished, still that sense that the Manor held its breath.

On a whim he fished for his wand in his pocket and tried to apparate himself to the other side of the door, but just as it had outside the Manor held him too tightly within its grip, and finally Theo gave up, his breath coming sharp and hard with effort.

Steeling himself, Theo pushed the door open and stepped into the library. They'd left the torches burning earlier, but one of the elves had been through, dousing the lights, tidying away the dinner things and neatening the piles of notes on his father's table.

Moonlight spilled through the tall windows in silver bars that unfurled across the green carpet, casting long, dark shadows between the bookshelves and glinting on the wrought iron staircase.

Theo took a step into the room and jumped as he caught sight of his own reflection, pale as a ghost, in the mirror at the end of the room, before the torches burst back into life.

He lowered his wand and ran a hand through his hair, blaming his lack of sleep and the evening chill for his unease. Nonetheless, he kept his eyes deliberately on the table as he stepped forwards and started to sift through the papers, searching for the note with his mother's handwriting.

Around him the silence was broken only by the creaks and sighs of the Manor settling, and the soft rustle of papers as he moved them out of the way. Theo found the stack of notes that he had been working on soon enough and drew the torn paper, with its teenage scribbles, out of it.

As before, he couldn't resist following the loops of his mother's handwriting with his finger, touching the paper that she had touched.

He was careful not to let his hand graze the sharp, blocky shapes of Bellatrix's writing.

And then those other elegant letters, the girl called V, with her neat, clever -

Theo blinked, the letters swimming slightly before his eyes, and then laid the paper down on the tabletop.

 _I had a friend called Vega_ -

He reached for the pile of parchment where Hermione's tawny owl-feather quill rested, and tugged a page of her notes towards him, smoothing it out beside the note.

\- _and she told me a story about the stars._

"Fuck," Theo breathed, eyes scanning between the two pieces of parchment, before he turned away, knocking the table with his hip in his haste and dislodging a pile of books and papers that went crashing to the ground as he rushed out of the library.

* * *

It had been three days with no word now, and Draco could feel nervousness crawling like insects beneath his skin.

He found himself imagining worse and worse scenarios, almost all of which seemed to end with Theo either horribly dismembered or absconding with Granger to some far-flung, sun-drenched island where they wouldn't have to worry about leaky magic or broken warding or corrupt governmental institutions ever again.

He wasn't sure which of these eventualities was the more distressing, and to make matters worse he was deeply frustrated that he was seemingly unable to keep his fears to himself.

"I'm sure they'll be back soon," Harry said, his voice half-muffled by his pillow. "Hermione wouldn't abandon us now."

"It's of absolutely no consequence _what_ Grange-"

"Please, Malfoy, I can hear your brain working from here." The words were soft as a sigh, and yet Draco found himself shutting up obediently.

Instead he raised their interlaced fingers, turning their hands back and forth in the streak of moonlight and silently admiring the contrast of tan and pale. He had found himself doing that a lot lately - finding excuses just to touch Potter - as though he could really be _that_ fascinated by the way his hands seemed to fit the dips and swells of muscle on his stupid torso.

As though he would actually marvel at the shape of Potter's fingers, or the taste of the underside of his jaw, or the noise that he made when Draco's teeth closed on his earlobe.

There was a little something of desperation to it; a little flavour of the edge; and Draco, no stranger to the vertigo of a perilous situation, surprised himself with how willing he was to peer into the abyss when the abyss had green eyes and golden skin and told him on a regular basis to shut up.

Draco gave a nonchalant sniff, unwilling to betray the mad trajectory of his thoughts. "For the record, Theo is hardly the abandoning type either."

"I never said he was," Potter yawned, and Draco fought to control his smile as he returned their hands to the bed. He couldn't resist grazing a finger along the line of bone that connected Potter's thumb to his wrist, before he turned onto his side to run his eyes over his rather frustratingly handsome profile. Potter could have used a haircut, but then that was nothing out of the norm, and if Draco was honest with himself he rather like the wild shock of his hair.

"What are you thinking?" Potter asked suddenly, turning to look at him, and Draco flushed, embarrassed to have been caught doing anything so sappy as gazing at him in the moonlight.

"You'll need a haircut before we next try to infiltrate the Ministry," he said coolly, regretting it when Harry disentangled their fingers to ruffle his hair self-consciously.

"Yeah," he said quietly. He reached for Draco's hand once more, the gesture so thoughtless that Draco swallowed, his heart suddenly feeling uncomfortably large in his chest. For a moment neither of them said anything, and then he realised that now they _were_ just gazing at one another in the moonlight, and in a moment of panic he flung himself out of the bed.

"I need a drink," he announced. "Is there - do you want - won't be a minute -"

"No, I'm fine -" he heard Potter say confusedly behind him, as he stumbled from the room.

Draco paused on the landing, comforted by the little thrill of Black family magic that had roused itself from slumber at his appearance. His heart was still beating too fast, his thoughts a jumbled mishmash of Potter's mouth and Potter's hands and the terrible, terrible truth of the matter that was he had _no idea_ how things had gone this far this quickly.

He'd thought it had been Granger, but it hadn't, it had been that warmth and light and _goodness_ that it turned out was actually coming from somewhere just to the side of where he had been looking, and all it had taken had been a stupendous amount of firewhiskey and a sloppy, drunken fumble for him to realise it.

It had made it hard to look anyone else in the eye, he was so sure that Potter must be written on every inch of his skin. He'd thought Theo might ask him about it when they had spoken in the library the other afternoon, but Theo had been distracted, sufficiently caught up in Granger that he hadn't seemed to realise that Draco's frustrated questioning about Gryffindors hadn't actually been about her at all.

Draco sighed, pushing a hand through his hair until it probably looked nearly as frightful as Potter's, and followed his feet downstairs. He barely paid any attention to where he was going until he stumbled into the candlelit kitchen and pulled himself up short, blinking through the light at the witch sat at the table.

"Aunt Andromeda," Draco stammered. "Forgive me, I didn't think anyone -"

"It's fine, Draco." Andromeda had swiped hurriedly at her eyes as he had entered the room, and a quick movement of her hand had slid something under the magazine in front of her. It was clear from her puffy face, however, that his aunt had been crying, and Draco paused a moment before he spoke, unsure whether it might not be better for him to simply leave.

"I -" he said, steeling himself. _You are brave_ , he heard Potter say to him. _You're braver than anyone gives you credit for_. "I never told you how sorry I am for your loss."

Andromeda nodded, smiling weakly. "Ted always ran towards danger," she said quietly, and Draco looked down, embarrassed, as fresh tears welled in her eyes. "Dora got it from him, I think."

He chewed his lip, considered, then - "I wish I could have met them."

Andromeda laughed. "Ted would have liked you, I think. Dora too." She moved the magazine slightly, and Draco watched as her fingers stroked the surface of the photograph that she had hidden underneath it.

"He used to say that I kept his feet on the ground," she said, voice almost a whisper, before suddenly looking up and staring Draco dead in the eye. "But I was the one who ran away to be with him." She smiled, though there was a grim edge to it. "Most of us Blacks have a reckless streak a mile wide."

There was something unfinished in the way she said it; something of an invitation; and Draco finally stepped fully into the room and slid into the chair opposite her.

When Andromeda pushed the photograph towards him he took it, watching as a smiling man with dark blonde hair tossed a laughing toddler into the air. The little girl's hair cycled from pink to sunshine yellow to a familiar turquoise blue and then back again to pink, her face a picture of delight in which Teddy's resemblance was clearly visible.

"We had nearly thirty years together," Andromeda said sadly, "but still it felt like -"

"If you had the chance over," Draco cut her off in a rush, "knowing what you know, would you do it again?"

Andromeda stared at him for a moment, and Draco felt his cheeks turning red. "That loved not wisely, but too well," she murmured, her eyes drifting back down to the the photo. "Sometimes loving someone is the danger," she said softly, "and sometimes -" here she gave him a knowing look "- it's not loving them."

Draco swallowed, thinking of Potter - Potter and his terrible smile and his terrible desire to _fix_ everything and the terrible way that he made Draco want to be _worthy_ of him. "I -" he tried to say. "Right - I -"

"Some dangers you just have to run towards," Andromeda smiled. "Even though you know they might destroy you."

She rose from the table and walked out of the kitchen, pausing only very briefly to press her hand to his shoulder.

* * *

Theo was lost.

He shouldn't have been lost - it shouldn't have been possible in his own Manor, with his own family magic surrounding him, and yet here he was. He'd taken a wrong turn coming out of the library, and in the dark, in his tiredness, he had somehow managed to lose his way, stumbling across a long, unfamiliar gallery where heavy golden pictureframes sat dark and empty.

A prickling feeling made its way up his spine, and Theo swallowed, picking his way carefully down the gallery towards the glimmer of moonlight he could see at the end.

When he was about halfway down he realised that he was looking at an ancient, black-spotted mirror, and in the same moment he felt the air at the back of his neck swirl, as though a breeze or a breath had made its way across his skin, and spun on his heel to peer back down the corridor. It was still, and silent, and after a few moments listening to the crash of his heartbeat Theo turned to look back at the mirror.

He could see his own face, pinched and pale, lit only by the bar of moonlight that fell from -

Theo stopped, stock still, as he realised there were no windows in the gallery for the strip of moonlight reflected in the mirror to be coming from.

 _Bad_ , said his brain, as he took another step forward.

 _Very bad_ , it repeated, as he closed the distance and reached out a hand to touch the shining surface.

 _Very very very very bad_ , he realised, as the silvered glass undulated like water, and he felt himself tipping forward, shapes and colours moving past him in a blur until they resolved into the same gloomy corridor he had just been standing in, only this time the torches were lit, and portraits snoozed idly in the frames.

Theo gripped his wand tightly and took a tentative step forward before he caught the gleam of candlelight on the golden-brown hair of a witch who stood looking away from him, and he stopped, stock-still.

Her back was straight, and her robes were of a formal cut that he had only ever seen when she went to the Ministry, but there was no mistaking the colour of the hair that he had wound around his fingers, the shape of her neck that he had

"Hermione?"

His voice was quiet, uncertain, but she glanced over her shoulder, gaze searching the gallery with a quizzical frown. Theo realised with horror as her eyes skated across him that she couldn't see him there, and he looked back at the mirror, where he was reassured to see his reflection.

Except - and he felt a wave of horror at the realisation - it wasn't his reflection. Rather it was his own image, frozen in the act of reaching for the mirror. Theo's stomach roiled queasily as he turned back to see that Hermione was now standing much closer to him, her wand out as she scanned the gallery warily.

"Is someone there?" she asked. "Aria?"

The breath Theo took sounded more like a sob, and Hermione's eyes snapped towards him, squinting carefully. Theo saw it the moment they focused; the moment she saw him. Her brows rose, her strangely cool expression opening up like a door, and he struggled not to rush towards her at the expression of devastation on her face.

 _Aria_ , she'd said.

"Hermione," he said again, his voice no more than a croak, and he watched as the hand holding her wand dropped to her side, the other rising to cover her mouth.

"Theo?" she whispered. "Is that - is it really -"

And it was she who rushed towards him, it was her hands that reached for his, and it was she who uttered a cry of frustration as her touch passed through him as though he were made of nothing more than smoke.

"Fuck," Theo gasped. "Fuck - don't move, I'll - I'll get one of the elves and -"

He stopped talking when she shook her head, and that was when he noticed that it wasn't just that she was dressed wrong, but that her hair, her bearing, everything was different - everything but the eyes.

"What's going on?" he asked. "Hermione where -" he looked up, taking in the torches, the portraits that were now watching Hermione, their expressions ranging from curiosity to open suspicion.

"How did you get here?" he asked, helplessly, and she shook her head again, more emphatically this time.

"No time for that," she said, though she bit her lip, regret clear as she raised her hand, tracing it over the air, just shy of his face. "I can't believe you're here," she whispered, and the way that she looked at him made chills move up Theo's spine.

He'd left her less than an hour ago by his reckoning, but the look in her eyes, like they hadn't seen one another for _years_ -

Theo gave a growl of frustration and made a grab for her, but it only had the unnerving effect of seeing his own fingers dissolve and reform as they passed through her wrist, gaining nothing but the vague impression of warmth - warmth and the slightest snag as they caught on the Vow that glittered there.

"Oh," she breathed, and the single syllable sounded like heartbreak and suffering and unbearable sadness. "You knew," she whispered, her hand still hovering in the air, not quite touching. "You knew but you didn't -" For a moment her face creased as though in pain. "Because I told you not to."

"Told me not to what?" Theo asked. "Hermione, tell me what's going on, I don't underst-"

"You can't tell her," Hermione said, then frowned, gnawing at her lip. "No, that's not right." She seemed to deliberate for a moment, and then brought her hands to cup his face. "You cannot tell me that you saw me here, Theo. Not ever, not even -"

"But -" To his horror, Theo felt the tightness of the Vow snapping tight between them, and then Hermione was standing up on tiptoe to brush her lips against his, though once again her touch was nothing but a suggestion, a movement on the air.

"I love you," she whispered. "There has never been anyone else, believe me that."

"Why wouldn't I -"

He stopped, frowning, at a muffled call from somewhere behind her. Hermione's expression froze, but she didn't look away from Theo as the voice called again, louder this time, though still oddly far-off and echoey. "Vega!"

Hermione half-turned to call over her shoulder, still not breaking eye her gaze from his.

"Just a moment!" she called back, and Theo felt himself stagger as he recognised the voice that called as his mother's.

"I'm sorry," Hermione said, as his mouth fell open and he stumbled back. "I'm sorry, I never -"

"Vega?" Theo interrupted her. "Vega like the story I -"

"Yes." The girl who was Hermione and not Hermione scrunched her eyes shut, a single tear falling over her cheek before she looked back at him. "I had to make a choice," she said, so softly he barely heard her. "And I will always have to make it, and so - so -"

"Don't," Theo begged, realising what she was about to do, but she shook her head.

"I have to," she said simply. "I forbid you to speak of this to anyone, Theodore Nott."

Theo gasped as the Vow glowed white hot on his arm. Hermione didn't flinch, but her eyes were shiny with tears as she raised them from his wrist to meet his.

Hermione, who was always so careful with her words, so deliberately ambiguous in her commands -

"Collected American Poets," she whispered, "in your father's library." Theo, still dazed, blinked in incomprehension.

"I -" he started to say, but then he heard her voice, really _heard_ it, calling his name from somewhere far off in the Manor, and he felt a tug at his back as he was drawn back towards the mirror. Hermione's face twitched as though in pain, but she held his gaze as Theo fell backwards onto the cold floor of the gallery, which was dark once more.

He had a glimpse of her tortured expression in the mirror before the surface rippled again and she was gone.

"No!" Theo yelled, leaping to his feet to slam his fist against the glass. "Hermione!" he cried, barely conscious of it cracking beneath his repeated assault, hardly hearing her voice behind him, shouting his name, until her hand was on his arm and she had wrenched him around to face her, face pale and frightened as she looked between his fist and the splintered surface of the mirror, stained crimson with his blood.

"Oh thank Merlin," he breathed, running his hands over her hair, her face, leaning forward and pressing his lips to hers, real and warm and pliant against his until she pushed him away.

"What the hell, Nott?" Hermione half-smiled at him, though her eyes were too bright with worry to make it believable. He went to bring his hand to her face but Hermione caught it in hers, glass fragments glittering in the low light. "Theo - your -"

She tested the fingers gently before looking back up at him. "What were you doing?" she asked, and Theo realised as his surroundings swam alarmingly that he was swaying unsteadily; that Hermione was holding him up.

"I -" He said. "You - you were - I -"

All at once his throat tightened, itching and burning with the spell's effect. Hermione's face swam in his vision, her dark eyes widening with shock and concern. For a moment he saw double - saw again that open door of an expression that she had worn in the mirror.

"What the fuck," he asked, glancing from his knuckles, sparkling with slices of mirror, to Hermione's worried face. "You were -"

"Oh Christ Theo." The words sounded thick and faraway, and he felt her fingers against his neck, where fire was burning, burning again -

"You -" Theo said again, but the words thickened on his tongue until they threatened to choke him, and as he struggled to speak he felt the warm drip of blood from his nose, the furious burn of the Vow around his wrist, but still he tried - _You were there, I saw you_ \- until finally his knees gave way and he sank into darkness.

* * *

 _ **A/N:** ARE YOU EXCITED? I am. Wheew. This chapter has been a long time coming. Again, I love getting your reviews but if you could avoid anything spoilery it would be huuuugely appreciated (and thank you so so much to all those reading!). **Kdougherty** and **Happy** this one's for you._


	23. Chapter 23

_**A/N:** Hello please have some not-quite explanations and some further intrigue and then fuck it, some smutty power-play. Welcome back, lads._

* * *

 **Chapter 23: Twist**

* * *

Sometimes time is the face of a clock. The hands twitch, the seconds chasing one another in an endless circle, over and over.

Sometimes it is a tapestry. Threads of every colour; the shimmering weave and weft of gossamer; the picture always but barely begun.

Sometimes it is a mirror. Smooth glass reflecting past to present to future to past.

Always such a very fragile thing.

Precise.

Breakable.

 **oOo**

At first when she'd woken to find Theo's side of the bed empty, Hermione hadn't worried. The sheets were still warm under her fingers and so she assumed that he must have got up to go to the bathroom, or for a glass of water. But the longer that she lay there alone, the more the feeling of dread built inexorably in her stomach; the silence of the Manor becoming a building ache that roared in her ears.

Eventually she pushed herself upright and reached for her discarded clothes before stepping carefully out into the hallway. Her wand was in her hand ready to cast a _Lumos_ when the nearest lamps blazed to life with nothing to prompt them except her presence.

"Well," she remarked to herself after a moment. "That's certainly convenient."

She couldn't help but think of the warded books that had opened to her touch; the harsh scrape of the blood wards across her magic when she had pulled them back from Theo. The enchantments of the Manor pressing and probing and falling away before her. Hermione told herself the prickle of gooseflesh on her arms was only from the cold.

The library seemed the natural place to start, but she found it empty and silent. Unlike in the corridor the lamps here did not light automatically, and the large room was illuminated only by the faint moonlight that crept through the windows. Hermione chewed on her lip, caught by indecision as to where to try next, before her eyes fell onto a pile of books and papers that looked as though it been knocked onto the floor.

"What were you up to?" she hummed to herself, as she knelt to gather up the mess. Standing slowly, Hermione turned to replace the pile on the reading table and noticed the ratty scrap of parchment that she was certain had not been there earlier. It was bathed in the moonlight, the writing as legible as if Hermione had lit the torches.

Depositing the pile of books on Theo's chair she reached for the note, then snatched her hand back as her eyes made sense of the words and she realised who the blocky letters belonged to.

She'd never seen Bellatrix's handwriting before, and Hermione felt her throat tighten with horror. It shouldn't have surprised her to find that she had been friends with Aria; both Andromeda and Narcissa had told Hermione how the Black sisters had been thick as thieves until Andy's final year at Hogwarts, and if they had both been friends with Theo's mother then naturally it followed that -

Blinking quickly to try and ward off tears, Hermione focussed instead on the third set of writing - the girl called V.

 _Emmeline Vance?_ she wondered. _Septima Vector?_ She couldn't see either of them being on cosy terms with Bellatrix Lestrange, even when they were at school, and besides, going by your last name wasn't common between friends in the wizarding world.

She reached out almost in spite of herself, running a finger across the letters. She didn't know the writing, she was sure, and yet there was something so familiar about it; that sense of oddness and prickling of the spine that she had come to associate with powerful magic.

Where had Theo found it? It didn't say much of anything, was just a scrap of the sort of inconsequential conversation that teenage girls were forever having, but still it gave her pause. Why hadn't Theo mentioned it to her?

Hermione's index finger moved thoughtfully, tracing the stubborn loop of a 'g'. _I'm not going_.

"Who were you?" she whispered aloud.

Silence - then - a crash from somewhere overhead; the sound of tinkling glass, and a great _whump!_ of magic as some sort of shockwave ripped through the Manor.

"Theo?!" Hermione cried. There was no response, but she could see magic dancing like sunspots on her vision. "Shit," she muttered under her breath as she turned and made her way unsteadily to the door. "Shit - Theo - _Theo_!"

"Is upstairs, Miss!"

Trinculo appeared at her side, his long, bony fingers closing around her wrist, and Hermione had barely registered what was happening when she realised from the churning in her stomach that the elf had managed to apparate them through the house. "How -" she started to ask, but at that moment there came another crash, and she turned away from Trinculo to spring up a short flight of stairs that led to a long gallery lined with empty picture frames.

"Hermione!" Theo was yelling, and she saw him then, stood in front of the cracked remains of a mirror, apparently beating his fists to bloody pulp against the smashed glass.

"What are you doing?" she asked, horrified, and Theo spun towards her, his eyes wild and his colour high.

"Oh, thank Merlin," he said, and before Hermione could say anything in response he had grabbed her by the shoulders, kissing her with a ferocity that would have been frightening if she hadn't been so relieved that he seemed to be alright.

Theo made a noise low in his throat that sounded like a sob, and Hermione, tasting blood on his lips, slowly leaned away from him, raising a hand to push his sweaty hair out of his face. Theo was staring at her with a bizarre expression: fear and incredulity and relief swimming together, each vying for dominance.

"What the hell, Nott?" she asked, trying for levity and feeling as though she had only half-succeeded. Theo's hand came up to touch her cheek and Hermione saw the moonlight glitter on the glass bedded in his knuckles and gasped. "Theo! Your -"

He didn't pull away when she tested the fingers, though she saw him wince and concluded there was at least one broken bone. "What were you doing?" Hermione breathed, looking back up at him.

"I -" Theo blinked dazedly, then looked quickly back at the destroyed mirror. "You - you were - I -" he tried to say, but the words were drowned in a choking cough. Hermione yelped with surprise as the golden glitter of the Vow burned to life around her wrist, but knew the sting of it could be nothing to the thick cord of fire that had lashed itself around Theo's throat.

"What the fuck?" he rasped. When he was silent for a moment the spell faded slightly, and he tried again to speak. "You were -"

She saw his eyes go wide as the fire flared back, squeezing tightly around his neck, the skin reddening and starting to blister beneath it.

"Oh Christ, Theo," Hermione whispered, reaching up to try and free him in spite of the part of her that knew that it was quite useless. The spelled fire burned her fingers and she snatched her hand back, and Theo caught her wrist, his grip painfully tight as he gritted his teeth and screwed his eyes shut, giving a growl of pain as blood started to drip from his nose.

"You," he managed to choke out, the tendons in his neck standing out, pushing against the skin, and then abruptly the spell went dark and Theo's eyes rolled upwards as he collapsed against Hermione. She barely caught him, the sudden dead weight making her stagger.

Even as she yelled for Trinculo, Hermione's mind was in overdrive, trying to parse how and when she could have given Theo a command that would mean he couldn't speak to her now. And why, for that matter, would the Unbreakable Vow be working when it had not before?

"Is here, Miss," Trinculo said from behind her, and Hermione let out the breath that she had been holding when the elf took some of Theo's weight, helping her lower him gently to the floor.

Hermione wasted no time on explanations, leaning in to take Theo's pulse and check he was still breathing. She suspected that he had passed out because the spell had put too much pressure on his windpipe, and was relieved when she felt the whisper of Theo's breath against her cheek, the flutter of his pulse against her fingers.

She blew out her own breath in a long stream as she sat up. There was a _crack!_ and Feste appeared next to Trinculo. She turned her head to the left and right, rheumy eyes taking in the dark corridor, her expression unreadable before she moved her sharp gaze onto Hermione. "What is Young Master and Miss doing?" she asked, and Hermione blushed.

"We - er -"

The old elf waved her hand. "Not bedroom doings, Miss. What is yous doing _here_?"

"I -" Hermione paused and bit her lip, looking around properly for the first time. The corridor was poorly lit, lined with creepy empty portraits, and was in a generally dusty and cobwebby state that contrasted sharply with the rest of the Manor, which the elves had kept in good order. "I don't know," she said finally. "I - Trinculo brought me to the stairs, but Theo was already here, with the mirror, and he - I don't know what he - he couldn't tell -"

Feste's eyes gleamed and she nodded once, tapping her knobbly fist against one of the panelled walls, which sounded solid enough. "Master is not telling Feste about this place," she muttered, with a vague air of disapproval. Her gaze flicked towards the mirror before she looked back at Hermione. "Miss will be helping Trinculo take Young Master back to his room," she said, in a tone that brooked no argument.

"Yes." Hermione's head felt thick, her thoughts slow and clouded. "Yes, of course. Trinculo what do you want me to -"

"Take Young Master's feet, Miss," Trinculo said with a faint smile, as he moved to take hold of Theo under his arms. Hermione tried to ignore the way Theo's head lolled back against Trinculo's shoulder. His skin held the sickly gleam of drying sweat, and under the red lines of the burns on his neck and the spots of high colour in his cheeks he was waxen-pale. She had enough time to take a deep breath before Trinculo apparated them back to Theo's room, where Feste was already plumping the pillows.

"On here," she said, and Hermione and Trinculo complied, depositing Theo in a somewhat undignified heap on the mattress.

"Now Miss will sit," Feste commanded, and Hermione obeyed wordlessly, allowing herself to be pushed into the armchair Feste had pulled up to the bedside. She watched as Trinculo produced a tub of burn ointment and started dabbing it on the raised, angry welts that circled Theo's throat.

Something touched her hand and Hermione jumped. Feste laughed quietly before she took Hermione's fingers again, smoothing the same ointment into the blisters that she hadn't even noticed forming where she had tried to snatch at the fire of the spell. "Miss is very brave," she said. Hermione couldn't quite tell if she was being complimented or told off.

"Do you know what that mirror was?" she asked, watching as a glittering cloud of dancing glass fragments slowly grew in the air above Theo's hands where Trinculo was painstakingly summoning them out of his knuckles.

"Master is hiding many things in the Manor," Feste said. Having finished applying the burn salve she perched on the arm of the chair by Hermione's side, watching Trinculo with a supervisory air. One of Feste's hands rested in her lap, but she brought the other up to rest on Hermione's hair. There was something strangely maternal in the gesture, and when Hermione looked at the little elf she met her eye steadily, her mouth a sad line. "Is hiding the past," she went on, "and is hiding the future. Things to be known and things to not be."

Hermione frowned and looked back at Theo as she struggled to process this. He looked as though he was in pain, she thought, his brows drawn into a frown and his forehead shiny with sweat. "But how could that trigger the Vow, or - or _stop_ it triggering, and what was the magic I felt before Theo -"

"Lots of different magics in these Manors," Feste hummed. "Lots of lockings and unlockings." She plucked something from Hermione's hair, then held the glass sliver up to the light, narrowing her eyes. "Young Master is swearing to Miss, yes?" she asked, and Hermione looked away from Theo to stare at her, blinking back tears that seemed to have sprung from nowhere.

"Yes, but for some reason it hadn't had any effect here before now."

"Paradoxes." Feste frowned, then flicked her fingers. The glass hung, glittering, in the air for a moment before disappearing. "If there is two of Miss, only one is being obeyed. Magic obeys hierarchies of -"

"Sorry," Hermione interrupted. "Sorry, Feste, but what do you mean if there's _two_ of me?"

Feste's ears quivered and her lips thinned. "Master is making pockets," she said slowly, still watching as Trinculo did something to Theo's hands that made him wince even while he was unconscious. "Is sewing the times together wrongly."

"I don't -" Hermione frowned, considering, and then hissed in sympathy as Trinculo dropped Dittany onto the deep cuts on Theo's knuckles. "Do you mean if we're still here tomorrow, somehow that time is overlapped with today, so Theo's Vow to me in the future cancels out the effect of the Vow in the here and now?"

"Is -" Feste made an odd little gesture, then paused and cocked her head at Hermione, giving her a long look. "Miss is a clever one," she smiled finally. "Master is telling Feste this."

Before Hermione could ask quite what, exactly, that was supposed to mean, Theo sucked in a deep breath and started coughing, and she forgot the odd non-sequitur as she scrambled out of the chair to get to him.

It wouldn't occur to her until later that Feste hadn't said _Young Master_.

 **oOo**

Ron had been in the office all night trying to finish his paperwork and now, as the enchanted windows began to brighten into pre-dawn, his head was turning fuzzy, the words of the form in front of him starting to swim. He tried to hold on to the fact that he'd always wanted to be an Auror as he began to write out, for the fourth or fifth time, the details of the previous afternoon's raid on an unlicensed Crup breedership.

"Noble work," he muttered to himself. "Important work." The reassurance was half-hearted at best.

"Keep telling yourself that," someone said, and Ron jumped, his quill leaving a fat blot of ink in place of the date as he looked up into Roger Davies' smiling face. "Alright there, Weasley?"

"Yeah," Ron set down his quill and rubbed at his temples, only belatedly realising that he'd very likely smudged ink all over his forehead. "Bugger."

"Here." Roger laughed, pulling out his wand, and Ron managed to stiffen only very slightly as the other man brought it up towards his head. " _Evanesco._ "

"Thanks," Ron said, covering his discomfort by yawning widely. "What time is it?"

"Nearly seven," Roger replied. "Early or late?"

"Bollocks. Late."

"Bureaucracy never sleeps," Roger grinned, then reached to clap Ron on the shoulder. "Why don't you head home once you're done with that? You've worked enough overtime to take the day."

"Yeah," Ron nodded. "I think I probably will." When Roger didn't remove his hand Ron tried to smile blithely up at him. "Can I help with something before I go, Rog?"

The other man made a face. "You can try not calling me ' _Rog_ ', for starters."

Ignoring the knot of anxiety in his stomach, Ron let his grin turn broad. "'Course, Roger. What's up?"

Roger gave him a long, thoughtful look. "Did Hermione Granger tell you she was planning on going somewhere?" he asked, eventually.

Ron didn't have to fake his frown. "Going somewhere?" he repeated.

"She and Nott seemed to have pulled a disappearing act," Roger sighed. "Mostly they're either at her place, Potter's, or meandering all over Muggle London, but yesterday morning they just - disappeared."

Ron allowed himself a careful beat of silence as he absorbed the implications of Roger having a tracking spell on either Nott or Hermione. "You could try Andy Tonks," he said slowly. "Hermione sometimes -"

"They're not there, either." Roger finally removed his hand before dropping gracelessly into the chair on the other side of Ron's desk. Ron watched him, saying nothing. Roger seemed animated by some odd, nervous energy, and years of dealing with Harry told Ron that he was likely to learn more if he simply waited it out.

"I threatened her," Roger admitted after a brief pause. "I just - it's like she doesn't care what they did, what that - what _Nott_ did, and after the Wizengamot case the other day I just -"

Ron remembered Hermione's pale face and grim expression at dinner a couple of nights before, the thrum of tension between her and Nott and the mingling of fury and concern on the dark-haired Slytherin's features every time he looked at her. "That probably wasn't the best idea," he said, cautiously.

"Yeah," Roger blew out his cheeks. "I realise that. Anyway, anywhere else you could think of that they might have gone?"

" _It has to be me," Ron had said, when they'd realised they needed someone inside the Ministry. He'd remembered saying it before, when they were only twelve years old, back when it had all still felt like an adventure._

" _It has to be you," Hermione had repeated back to him only a few months ago. "You're the only one they don't suspect."_

He felt a deeper sympathy with Snape than he had ever expected to as he leaned back in his chair. "If you really can't find them, then I would imagine it's because they've managed to find Nott Manor."

Roger's eyebrows shot upwards. "Thoros Nott told them how?"

"I think so," Ron nodded. "I mean, it isn't like Hermione'd tell _me_ -" he gestured to his robes, and Roger grinned "- but she's an awful liar, so when she said the visit had been fruitless I'll admit I didn't exactly buy it."

"You still on the outs with her and Potter?" Roger grimaced sympathetically, but Ron was watching him closely enough from the corner of his eye to note see the other man's eager stillness, and so made a show of huffing with annoyance.

"If you mean do I still think they're being ridiculous with this whole doom and gloom theory? Then yes." He let his mouth edge towards a smirk. "Hermione always hates being proved wrong, so I'm just waiting for the day I can say ' _I told you so_ ' and see the look on her face."

Roger gave a bark of laughter, and rose out of his chair. "Can't come soon enough, I'd reckon."

"Too right," Ron smiled, then sighed and looked down at the forms on his desk. "Right, I think I'm going to call it a night. Or a morning. Or something."

"Sounds about right," Roger nodded, his face turning thoughtful. "If Granger and Nott have managed to find his Manor then we don't have much option than to wait for them to reappear."

Ron ducked his chin in agreement, then stretched his arms behind him, wincing when he heard his shoulder pop. "Let me know if they turn up, won't you?"

Roger gave a wave of his hand before turning and heading towards his office at the other end of the bullpen. "Absolutely."

Five minutes later and still turning the conversation over in his mind, Ron climbed the stairs towards the atrium, mumbling apologies as he made his way against the flow of early morning traffic.

The irony of it wasn't lost on him: how pretty much anyone, if asked who was the brains of the Golden Trio, wouldn't hesitate before answering. He'd even say the same thing himself, knowing (and long since having come to terms with the knowledge) that Hermione possessed a level of intelligence that he himself could never aspire to.

Because of _course_ Hermione was the brains. She was brilliant, she was furiously loyal, she had a sense of justice so keen that you could be cut to ribbons on it, and - contrary to what Ron had told Roger - when called upon to do so she could lie with enough conviction to fool even Bellatrix Lestrange. But in spite of all that, the fact remained that she was hopeless at chess.

Not to say that she couldn't read a board - certainly, she could always be relied upon to see the best move available. But she didn't think four moves ahead, or the four moves beyond that which could mean the win.

Hermione was the brains of the trio, without a doubt. But she wasn't the strategist. She wasn't the spy.

" _You remind me of your uncle," Narcissa Malfoy had said to him after that first, fraught meeting around the table at Grimmauld Place._

" _Bilius?" Ron had asked stupidly, and then had flushed scarlet when she laughed at him._

" _Gideon," she said, and there had been something strange in her voice as it shaped the name. "Not such a typical Weasley," Narcissa murmured, looking at him a moment longer before she disappeared back up the stairs with a swish of robes._

Chosen One, Mudblood, Weasley. No one ever seemed to realise that being underestimated was something that the three of them had always had in common.

Ron smiled ruefully to himself as he closed his hand around his wand, whispering " _Finite Incatatem_ ," just to be on the safe side before he stepped into one of the Ministry Flooplaces. "Number twelve, Grimmauld Place."

 **oOo**

The glitter of glass became the glitter of Hermione's eyes; that flash of horror and sorrow before she had invoked the Vow became terrified confusion as the spell roared to life around his neck. He could feel the lingering burn of it, and Theo was coming to the conclusion that he had had just about enough of being choked and burned by all of this stupid fucking magic that his father had seen fit to booby-trap the Manor with when his eyes flew open and he gulped a lungful of air, his much-abused throat immediately spasming in protest.

"Theo?" Hermione's face appeared in the clear spot at the middle of his slightly blurred field of vision, curls haloed in lamplight. She looked tired and pinched with worry, the corners of her mouth downturned and her brows climbing her forehead in an almost comical inverted 'V'. Theo tried to say her name and then just started coughing again, and Hermione's head disappeared for a moment before her hand was helping him upright so that she could hold a glass of water to his lips.

"Are you alright?" she asked, when he tipped his head back against the pillow. His chest was still heaving, but he didn't feel quite so much as though he was about to die.

"What happened?" he managed to rasp.

Hermione didn't answer for a moment, setting the glass back down on the bedside table before laying her hand against his chest. Theo covered it with his own, feeling the minute tremors running through her fingers. "You scared me," she said softly, and Theo pursed his lips.

 _I can't believe you're here,_ she whispered to him in his memory, eyes wide and terrified.

"That isn't an answer," he pointed out, and Hermione shrugged.

"You're the one who took exception to what I can only assume was a Dark magical object."

 _I had to make a choice._

"I don't remember," Theo told her, watching the way the corner of her mouth tightened when she heard the lie in his voice.

"Feste told me," she said slowly. "She told me that your father did something to make time move oddly in the Manor, and that if the future were folded over our present, that it might mean the Vow didn't work today."

Theo looked sharply at Feste, who gave him an utterly guileless smile. "Yeah," he said, choosing his words carefully. "That must be it. You two can go," he added, to the waiting elves. "I've no intention of having any more near-death experiences today."

Feste and Trinculo exchanged a glance before the old elf nodded. "Yes, Young Master."

"So I'm guessing I told you not to tell me any secrets about the future?" Hermione said once they had gone. Her smile had turned teasing, but Theo could feel the tension in her hand.

"Something like that," he smiled, and Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Sounds like me," she said. "Ron always says I'm no fun."

"Well." Theo swallowed.

 _I'm sorry_.

He could see the tears in her eyes, the worry that pulled her face tight; the same expression of anguish that she had worn when she invoked the Vow.

"Ron and I will have to disagree on that," he said, sliding his hand around her waist and pulling her closer. "I think you're very fun indeed."

The kiss started gentle, but it didn't stay that way. It was as though he had her here, now; her taste in his mouth and her hair in his hands and the sound of her sigh when his hands found their way under her jumper; but he was also reaching back through the mirror, catching at that straight-lined sharp-angled version of her and drawing her back to him.

 _There's never been anyone else._

She obeyed the commands of his hands when he pushed her shoulder back, twisting her under him on the bed to cover her body with his. Hermione's fingers scrabbled at his waistband until Theo caught one wrist, moving it up to pin it to the headboard with a wordless, wandless sticking charm.

"What -" Hermione lifted her chin, breaking the kiss as she pulled uselessly at her arm. "What are you doing?"

 _I had to make a choice, and I will always have to make it_.

It had made him angry, he realised. The powerlessness of it. The knowledge that somehow, somewhere in the future, they were going to be separated.

 _I will always have to make it_.

But he had her right now.

"Trust me," Theo whispered, and when he took hold of her other wrist Hermione let him pull it up to the headboard. He didn't break her gaze, watching as her pupils dilated, black eclipsing brown.

"Will you stop if I ask you to?" she murmured.

"It's not really a case of asking, is it?" Theo dipped his mouth into the soft hollow at the edge of her jaw. "Do you want me to stop?" he breathed, watching the gooseflesh rise down her neck.

"No, but, _oh_ , no I don't -"

"If you do," he started to work her jeans down her hips, "just say 'Vow'."

"Funny," Hermione gasped.

"You'd prefer a different safeword?"

The look she shot him spoke volumes, and Theo grinned as he left her jeans around her ankles, raising his eyebrows when he looked up at her. "Miss Granger," he murmured, "you seem to have forgotten your underwear."

"I was a little preoccupied looking for you, you -"

"No more talking." Theo braced himself above her as he shimmied free of his own trousers. Hermione bit her lip when he leaned down, brushing his nose up from the base of her chin until his mouth was covering hers again, teasing her lips apart with his tongue as he nudged his rapidly-hardening length against her.

She made a tiny sound, hips arching upwards, and Theo knelt back, taking in the sight of her as she lay, spread out for him. He moved his fingers between her legs, testing her flesh and finding her wet and flushed as he slid two inside.

"Oh shit," Hermione breathed, and Theo raised an eyebrow, withdrawing his fingers.

"What did I say about talking?"

Her eyes flashed, but she folded her lips together when his fingers went back to work, and Theo watched as her skin gradually turned rosy from chest to cheeks, her breaths coming short.

He felt her muscles clench around him before she moaned low in her throat, her eyes scrunching closed. Theo allowed himself a smug grin before he reached up and released her wrists, turning her quickly under him and then entering her fast from behind.

"Fuck," Hermione hissed, and he drew back quickly, abruptly worried that he might have been -

"Did I say stop?" she murmured, reaching back and digging her fingers into his hip, her head half-turned so that he could see the curve of her lips when he thrust back in. Theo exhaled into her shoulder, tasting salt against his tongue. When he obeyed his own possessive instinct and sank his teeth into her skin Hermione cried out, tightening around him in a tremulous wave of movement that made his hips stutter in their motion.

"Say you're mine." His breath was coming sharp now, rasping in his still-damaged throat, and his eyes were filled with the marks on her shoulder, ringed by the red impressions of his teeth.

 _There's never been anyone else._

"I'm yours," she gasped. "I'm yours, Theo, yours, yours -"

Theo caught the words with his mouth as he snapped his hips and saw stars behind his closed eyes.

 _Vega_ , he remembered. _Vega is the Weaving Girl, and Altair_ -

"Bloody hell, Theo," Hermione said softly, and he huffed a laugh into her neck, pressing his lips to her shoulder and then laving his tongue across the marks.

"You don't know my middle name, do you?" They had been lying there a while, sweat turning cool on their bodies, and Hermione turned to face him, frowning.

"I didn't know you had one," she said. "It wasn't on any of the Wizengamot documents."

"Mm." Theo's fingers danced over her skin. "My father had something of a sense-of-humour-failure about it after my mother's death and had it removed from the official records." He stroked her shoulder again. "Theodore Altair Nott," he murmured, and Hermione's eyes widened.

"Altair," she breathed.

"Something of a coincidence," he said, deliberately light, but he could see her mind working.

"Why didn't you say anything last night?" she demanded. "Why did you - why did you go back to the library, Theo, what was that note - that - who's V?"

"You don't miss a thing, do you?" he grinned, and Hermione wrinkled her nose and punched his shoulder. Theo laughed, catching her hand and then tightening his arms around her. "I don't know," he whispered, which wasn't entirely a lie. "I don't know who she is. And I didn't say anything because you were half-asleep." She made a soft sound of protest, and he kissed the shell of her ear, glad that she couldn't see his face as he tried to master his worry. "But I do think we need to go back to the library."

 _Her eyes shone with anguish. "Collected American Poets," she whispered._

 **oOo**

Say that there was a room buried deep beneath the ground, so ancient that it had no recorded beginning - that it had simply always been.

Say that what bloomed in the room had a voice, an energy, and it called out with a soundless command, drawing people in.

Say it was secret; say it was strange. Say that in order to protect it - in order to study what was found in the room, and in the rooms adjacent to it - a building was erected above. Say that the building became the first of many: a village, then a town, then a city.

Say that the room had been sealed for a year by a spell thick with blood, nothing passing through the firmly-locked door except for a slow, steady seep of magic.

Say that somewhere beyond the heavy oak there came a sound like the tinkle of breaking glass.

Say that slowly, slowly, something stirred to life.

* * *

 _ **A/N:** Sorry for the long break you guys, and thank you so much for waiting. Hope you enjoyed it! This got up to 1000 reviews while I was faffing around, which is insane. And awesome. I love you all. _

_Also the thing with Theo's name - I realised I hadn't included it in an earlier chapter because I am a Gigantic Idiot, but if you were to read back you would find that this has been very sneakily corrected. Apologies for the glaring error, with love from a hopeless person who will from here onwards make sure to quadruple-check that all of her Important Plot Points have been included._


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24: Trick**

* * *

The panelling was warm under his hand, and the crone-spun rug soft beneath his bare feet. Theo took a deep breath, turning his head to look down the length of the corridor, towards where dust motes danced in the green-stained sunbeams that lanced through the stained-glass window.

"Are you going to linger out there all day?"

He jumped, looking quickly to where his father stood, framed by the doorway to his study. Thoros watched him for a moment, unblinking, and then jerked his head to command Theo follow him into the room.

"You have to learn." Theo's hands tightened on the arms of the leather chair as his father's voice whispered in his ear. Thoros gave him an impenetrable look, and Theo turned his eyes away from his father towards the fire that blazed in the grate. The heat of the room was stifling, the light of the flames licking the evening shadows into cowed submission in the corners.

"Pay attention!"

His father's knuckles rapped the marble chessboard that sat between them, and Theo looked down to see his white pieces glaring back at him. When he met his father's gaze Thoros pursed his lips. "This is important, Theodore." He gestured pointedly at the board. "White always begins."

Theo leaned forward obediently, his feet swinging above the floor, as he ran his eyes over the pieces. When he chose a pawn in the middle of the board his father nodded, and Theo lifted it to move it two squares forward. In his small hands the marble felt cool, the carved edges almost sharp against his soft palms.

"A nice opening," Thoros nodded, lips curving with approval. "And of course, play always starts with the minor pieces." He chose a pawn of his own, and then reached across the board towards Theo's pieces, glancing upwards when his hand lingered above a knight. "May I?"

Theo's eyes were fixed on Thoros's hands, which were long-fingered and elegant, and for some reason they reminded him of his own, even though his were so much smaller -

"Theodore?" An edge of icy steel in his father's voice, and Theo nodded.

"Show me," he whispered.

Thoros's fingers closed on a white knight. "Virtue rides to the defence of the innocent," he muttered, before moving his hand back for another black pawn. He had his son's full attention now, and he moved the bits of black and white marble deftly back and forth in a complex dance across the board. Theo could feel his heart speeding, his eyes darting across the black and white squares, trying to predict -

"And then," Thoros breathed, "they start to fall."

Theo flinched as the first pawn was smashed out of play, the little figurine's eyes rolling upwards as its body turned limp. Thoros was grinning now, every motion precise and economical, guiding pieces to their destruction. "Then of course," he said finally, "You line up your defenses."

His father set one of his knights down with a barely audible _chink_ of marble, and Theo dug his nails into the arms of the chair as the armoured figure raised its lance and swiped the last remaining white bishop from the board.

The white queen and king stared forwards, their gracefully carved features set in calm resignation as they faced off against the remaining black pieces.

Theo closed his eyes, filled with a sense of foreboding and dread. "What happens now?"

His voice sounded childish and far away, and when his eyes opened he was sat on the other side of the board, gazing into his own eight-year-old face.

He remembered now - the close warmth of the evening, the way his father's hands had moved the pieces with such assured delicacy.

He remembered how Thoros had answered him.

"The endgame," Theo muttered to himself, and when he reached for the white queen the hand was as he remembered - a man's hand, with the long fingers that he had inherited from his father.

As he closed those fingers around the queen she tilted her head to look up at him, and as her curling hair fell backwards over her shoulder Theo realised her face was Hermione's.

"Theodore Altair," she whispered. "It's time to -"

 **oOo**

"- wake up," Hermione whispered, her lips just below Theo's ear. She felt it the moment he came back from wherever his dreams had taken him: a twitch in the magic of the house that matched the sudden tensing of the arm that was tucked beneath her ribs.

Theo turned to look at her, hazel eyes dark in the morning gloom. "Hi," he rasped, and Hermione winced at the evidence that his throat hadn't yet healed from the burns. He lifted his free hand and drew a finger around the edge of her eye socket, his expression thoughtful. "How long were we asleep?"

"A few hours?" she guessed. "But I think we -"

"We've been here too long," Theo nodded, and began to push himself upright. "It's my fault, I -"

"No," Hermione interrupted him as she sat up as well. "No - it - I don't know what happened upstairs, and -" Theo opened his mouth, but she pressed her fingers to his lips. "I know you can't tell me." Hermione smiled, though she was thinking of Feste's words.

 _Lots of lockings and unlockings._

"Something's changed," she went on quietly, and she watched Theo's expression sharpen; could almost have sworn she saw his ears prick up. "You can feel it, right?"

Like a whisper up the spine; like a cold draft against the skin.

 _Magic_.

He looked back at her, and nodded. "Let's go."

 **oOo**

Again, again, back to the library, following the threads of magic that curled through the old house. All around him Theo could sense the Manor stirring into wakefulness: layers of enchantments responding to his sense of urgency, calling out to the deep wells of energy that he drew on only in the most desperate moments.

The image of the chessboard would not leave him. _The endgame_. Hard to separate the dream from the real memory of that evening in his father's study, watching as Thoros taught him different plays; different strategies.

 _Virtue rides to the defence of the innocent_.

As he drew Hermione after him down the main staricase, Theo recalled his father's stories of how wizarding fastnesses would cleave to their masters' every whim in the old days of persecution by muggles, and his still-tender throat tightened at the thought of the thing that had lain dormant in the wards. There was nothing virtuous about that, and nothing innocent about whatever it was guarding inside the Manor.

Theo could almost hear the echo of its whisper; of the way that it had sung to him as its dark fire curdled in his veins.

 _Your blood your blood your blood your -_

"What's happening?" Hermione asked behind him, and Theo's fingers clenched around hers, feeling the way the bones moved under her skin. Too tight - too tight - but he couldn't shake the remembered feeling of her hands passing through his grip, and was possessed by the mad notion that if he only kept hold of her then they would never be forced apart.

"Theo." Hermione's voice cut through his thoughts as she pulled sharply against him, and he turned to see her eyes following the wavering threads of magic that sparkled on the air. "Tell me what's going on."

Theo felt the tingle of the Vow about his wrist as different layers of compulsion warred against one another, and his mouth had fallen half-open before he realised that he was obeying her.

 _Theodore Altair. It's time to wake up_.

The name, Theo realised. He hadn't spoken the name aloud in years - since before his mother died - and a name -

"I think there was a spell," he said, still turning it over in his mind. "A spell in my name, and when I - when _you_ said it aloud -"

One of the most elementary aspects of magic, and one of the first things a young witch or wizard learned, was that the naming of a spell shaped its effects, and that the naming of a person could shape their entire life. Theo had only discovered the full history of Tom Riddle in the months since he had been released from prison, but now he thought that there had never been a better example of the way that a name could carve a mark upon the world than _Lord Voldemort._

 _A name._ Something easy to say, but hard to forget. The sort of thing that a woman cast out of time might cling to. An old magic, complex in its workings, but elegant in its simplicity.

Exactly the sort of thing that he would expect from her.

Theo added up the years in his head: ten since his mother had died; twenty since his birth. How much longer before that?

How long ago had a girl paused before a portrait in a candlelit corridor, turning towards the echo of another time? How had this girl, this Vega; who wore the face of someone that he loved but who held herself like a stranger; become so important to Theo's mother that she had slipped an echo of her name into her son's - an echo powerful enough that when it was spoken - what, thirty years later? - it unlocked something that had stayed hidden beneath -

 _An obligation of the blood_. Theo's spine prickled as he remembered the look on that other Hermione's face - sad and disbelieving and determined - when he had stepped through the mirror.

What was it that Feste had said? _If the future were folded over the present_ -

But where did the fold lie, and where were they within it? Together, or apart?

His mother's voice as she read aloud to him, echoing through the years: _And time future contained in time past -_

"Theodore Altair," Hermione murmured, and Theo felt the magic go taut and shivering around them. He could see from the look on Hermione's face, suddenly bloodless, that she did too.

 _My little Theodore Altair_.

Theo shook the memory of his mother away and laid his hand on the door, feeling the quivering pulse of the wood against his palm. The tremor made its way through him and down his arm to where he still gripped Hermione's hand in his, and he heard her sharp intake of breath as she felt the shock of it.

"What's in there?" she asked. "What's changed?"

 _Everything_ , he wanted to say, but the word stuck in his throat, and he had to concentrate on the feeling of her fingers threaded with his to stop the wave of nausea that threatened to overtake him before he eventually spoke. "I think that someone hid - I think if my father had had the spell to open the Department, he would have done it."

Hermione's voice was careful when she answered. "You know him better than me."

"Yeah." Theo exhaled the word, squaring his shoulders and staring down the door. "And I know that he was fucking _obsessed_ with that place."

"Hidden in plain sight," Hermione murmured thoughtfully. "Right under his nose the whole time." She laid her hand next to Theo's, and he watched her eyebrows crease together as the magic licked at her palm. "Maybe he was afraid," she continued softly, turning her eyes up towards his. Hearing the question, the nudge, in her voice, Theo smiled ruefully down at her.

"Maybe," he agreed, taking his hand from the door to run the backs of his knuckles down her cheek, finally coming to rest at the side of her neck where he could feel her pulse beating, fast but steady. Whatever was in there, whatever his name on her lips had released, it was one step closer to that strange girl in the gallery the night before. Theo could hardly bear the thought that he might lose her, that somehow she might be taken from him. It seemed insane to remember the way her hands had passed through him in the gallery, when the warmth of her skin under his fingers was somehow more real than anything else that he had ever known.

"Promise me," he heard himself saying, before his mind had even caught up to his voice. "Promise me that whatever happens, you'll find a way back to me."

"I -" Hermione paused, biting her lip, and then surprised him by tugging on his arm, grabbing at his collar with her other hand to pull his mouth down to hers. It wasn't the answer that he had asked for, and yet Theo surrendered himself to the kiss, trying to tell her everything that his vow to her meant that he couldn't put into words.

"I'm here," Hermione said, a little breathlessly, once they finally broke apart. She leaned her forehead against his shoulder, and he felt her lips move against the fabric of his shirt as she spoke. "Wherever I end up, I'm here now, and I will find a way back." She leaned away, and Theo was somehow unsurprised to see that her eyes were swimming with tears when she looked up at him. "Will that do?"

"I suppose." He touched her cheek again, marvelling at the way it fit inside his palm.

Her dark eyes searched his, and then she closed her fingers around his wrist. "Whatever it is that you can't tell me, I trust you," she said. "Can you do the same for me?"

Theo felt his throat tighten. _I'm sorry_ , she'd said.

And here, now, with her in his arms, was there anything else to be done?

"I trust you, Hermione." He ran his fingers across her cheeks again, by now knowing her face as much by feel as by sight. _Come back to me_ , he thought, but he only swallowed hard, and returned her tight smile, before, unable to think of any other way to delay, he pushed the door open.

Immediately Theo was assailed by the eerie quiet of the library, bathed in the strangeness of the late morning light. Nothing had moved since the night before, but he could _feel_ magic seething through the room like a powerful itch beneath his skin.

"Theo?"

Hermione's voice sounded faint, oddly muffled as Theo surrendered to the powerful draw of whatever spell it was that had twisted into life. He followed the thread of it past his father's desk with its mounds of papers and towards a narrow set of shelves that sat half in shadow at the far end, where his hand rose as though controlled by a string to lift a thick volume from the shelf. Its spine was worn threadbare, shining glue and yellowed paper showing through, and -

"That's a muggle book," Hermione said, sounding far more scared than she had in the hallway. "Theo, why is there -"

He could hardly hear her over the sound of blood rushing in his ears as he gazed down at the page that had fallen open. He couldn't even see the neatly folded parchment that had marked it, because his eyes had caught on the words, and his breath left him in a noise that sounded like a sob.

 _A man must have a mind of winter, or have been cold a very long time -_

"A mind of winter," Hermione breathed, reading over his shoulder. "Isn't that what your -"

"A muggle poem," Theo said. "All those years, and it was from a _muggle poem_." He threw the book to the floor, hardly caring that pages scattered, that the few scraps of parchment that had been folded between them fluttered on the air. "What _is_ this?" he demanded. "Is this whole thing just designed to - to _fuck_ with us or -"

"I don't know." Hermione was shaking her head as she snatched at his hands before Theo could drag them through his hair. "I don't know but we have to - we have to know what it is."

Theo froze, blinking down at the whirl of papers on the floor before he bent to pick up the parchment that had fallen free, which he could see now was a sealed packet addressed to -

"Theodore Altair Nott." Hermione's voice quavered as she read the writing, and Theo didn't bother to hide the way his fingers shook as he ran them across the letters of his name.

The parchment glowed at his touch, and the wax seal - _two stars_ , he thought, disbelieving - dissolved to nothing. He looked up at Hermione to see that she looked as shocked as he felt.

"I guess - I guess we know why your father wasn't able to give Voldemort the spell," she said, with what looked like a vague attempt at a smile. Theo heard the hesitation in her voice, and when he lifted his gaze to hers he knew that she was remembering Thoros's last words as they had left Azkaban.

 _A mind of winter, Theodore. Do not forget what you are._

"He knew where it was, though." Theo swallowed. "He wanted me to find it."

Hermione bit her lip, but she didn't disagree, just watched as Theo slowly, carefully, unfolded the parchment.

He glimpsed faded lettering in an antiquated hand; some diagrams that looked like those that Narcissa had stolen; and knew, deep in the core of himself, that they had found what they needed to reopen the Department of Mysteries. When he passed them to Hermione she hummed softly, her brow creasing in concentration, and Theo took advantage of her distraction to quickly read the note that had been tucked into the packet, written in that same neat but looping cursive that he now recognised as a more florid version of Hermione's handwriting.

 _Theo,_

 _I knew that your father could not be allowed to share this knowledge with the Dark Lord, and so I hid them away where only you could find them._

 _I am sorry for what is to come, and sorrier still that it cannot be prevented. Everything that will happen has already happened, for there is only this one life that we are given, and we must bear the consequences of our choices by living it. I cling to the hope of one day seeing you again, and find consolation on page 74._

 _Nothing is ever really lost, my love._

Still feeling as though he might wake up any second, Theo bent to pick up the tattered book, turning the pages with clumsy fingers until he found the page the note suggested.

 _Nothing is ever really lost, or can be lost -_

The words sent something cold sliding down his spine, and his vision doubled for just a second - the dank scent of stone filling his nose, thickening in his throat - and then he was back in the room.

"What's that?" Hermione's voice made him jump, and wordlessly he turned the book towards her, watching as her eyes darted across the words.

"'- _ever the spring's invisible law returns_ ,'" she read aloud, thoughtfully. "You know, I think my dad used to read me this one."

Theo's laugh sounded hollow even to his own ears. "Well at least that makes more sense than _my_ father having this."

"Hidden in a muggle book," Hermione mused, closing the book and running her hand over the cover. "You know," she said quietly, "it's so weird, but I feel like I -" She stopped mid-sentence, face creasing, before she made a soft exclamation, and her hand fluttered upwards to clench in in the empty air above her heart. " _Oh_."

"What?" Theo demanded. "What's -"

"The warding," Hermione answered. "Didn't you feel it - the warding just -"

There was a crash from somewhere else in the Manor, and then a cacophony of voices echoed up the stairs. The sound of heavy footsteps - and then the library doors were thrown open to admit a flood of Aurors, headed by Roger Davies and Ron Weasley.

"Wands down!" Davies yelled, brandishing his own, and Theo obeyed, lowering the wand he was barely even aware of having raised as he saw Hermione do the same from the corner of his eye.

"You're trespassing," he said quietly. "This is my property, and I -"

"Don't even try it, Nott," Davies spat. "You're in enough trouble as it is."

"Trouble for what?" Hermione seemed to bristle next to him, and Theo caught himself just before he reached out to lay a hand on her arm.

"Perverting the course of justice," Ron said from behind Davies shoulder. "Absconding the jurisdiction of the Wizengamot and -"

"Wait, what?" Hermione shook her head, nose wrinkled in confusion. "We've only been gone a couple of days."

Davies barked a laugh, but Theo saw Ron's face turn a few shades paler before he cleared his throat, and spoke quietly. "You've been missing for seven weeks."

 **oOo**

Later, when the dank scent of old stone fills his nostrils and the cold fizz of magic threads through his veins, Theo will remember the words.

 _Nothing is ever really lost, or can be lost._

His fingers will close on empty air, where there should have been a hand. Around his wrist something golden will shimmer, and as his vision blurs he will try and focus on the fading light.

 _The light in the eye grown dim, shall duly flame again._

Her voice, when she calls his name, will sound very far away.

* * *

 _ **A/N:** I've been missing decidedly longer than seven weeks, and unfortunately cannot say how long it will be before I update again. To everyone who has read this, and especially those who have reviewed, thank you. You make it a little easier to grope my way back to the path. If you are interested in the poems, they are **The Snow Man** by Wallace Stevens, and **Continuities** by Walt Whitman, with a smidge of **Four Quartets** by T S Eliot thrown in for luck._


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